After holding Chelsea to a goalless draw last weekend, Gus Poyet's side looked tired against City, but Buckley expects a response when they return to action at Anfield.
The defeat extended Sunderland's winless run to four matches in the Premier League, and left them two points above the drop zone.
Buckley says they must raise their game on Saturday, and is confident they can get a result against Brendan Rodgers' side.
"It was a massive effort last Saturday and a good point but it does take it out of you, as you saw on Wednesday night against City," he told the club's official website.
"Hopefully we can look ahead now and have a good performance against Liverpool.
"We don't want to dwell on bad performances and bad results so we will try and get it out of our system as soon as possible.
"We need to find a bit of the performance from Chelsea and take it to Anfield, but I'm sure we will do a lot better than we did against City.
"We are confident. We will take a game plan there and hopefully this time we can execute it better."
