Andrew Shanle figures he’s better off skipping the details when the folks back in St. Edward ask him what it’s like playing free safety at Nebraska.

After all, being a safety in eight-man high school football amounted to “you back pedal once, read pass or run, and play,” Shanle said.

Tierre Green understands why Shanle would want to leave out the job responsibilities and just mention his tackle or interception numbers.

Green is the Huskers’ starting strong safety, and played that position when he was at Omaha Benson. He also played running back. So, surely, when he was on offense,  he checked out where the opposing safeties lined up — right?

“Nah. I was just like ‘Give me the ball and I’ll make something out of it,’” Green said.

If only it were that easy for Nebraska opponents.

Instead, when a quarterback breaks the huddle to survey the Blackshirts, he’s just as likely to look first at the two players who are often at least 15 yards past the line of scrimmage.

“They tip the coverage,” Nebraska’s Zac Taylor said of safeties.

Sometimes.

But with the proliferation of cover-2 schemes in college football, not only is it becoming harder for quarterbacks to get a good read on defenses, it’s becoming rarer to see safeties line up at only one position.

“I’ve never felt there was much difference in the two (free safety and strong safety) — at least in the way we play them, there isn’t,” said Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops, who played both positions at the University of Iowa. “Any more, most people are going to support (the run) with their free safeties as much as they are with their strong.”

At one point this season, Sooner defensive back Reggie Smith started at three positions in three weeks. Free safety Darien Williams is the only player in OU’s secondary to start all five games in the same position.

Stoops said a lot of the safety concepts being used today — quarter-, half-field and three-deep coverages — were just as prevalent in the 1980s.

Teams nowadays, though, are more apt to go heavier with a cover-2 secondary.

Essentially, what Nebraska often does is divide the field into quarter sections. The 2 in cover-2 refers to halves of the field, with each safety being responsible for one half of that territory.

In reality, that defense is a 4-5-2 alignment, where the three linebackers and two cornerbacks are perhaps 12 yards deep in order to give them a jump on getting to their respective zones.

The safeties line up even farther back.

“In the end, what makes (safeties) really good is their ability to tackle, their ability to recognize plays and their physical ability to cover ground,” Stoops said.

They also better be strong communicators. Safeties make calls to the cornerbacks regarding formations of the offense, point out where particular players are and also have to recognize when linebackers have a blitz call.

“It’s really about the person’s ability of taking information and processing it fast. That’s the main thing about safety that’s hard,” Green said. “You could be a 4.4 (40-yard dash) guy and if you don’t process stuff fast enough you’re not going to make plays very often. But if you’re a 4.6 guy and you can see where it’s happening before it happens, then you’re with the play.”

Green and Shanle’s individual statistics do fall in line with how one might view their positions.

As a strong safety, Green has more situations where he’s supporting the run, thus it’s not surprising that he’s Nebraska’s third-leading tackler. Shanle, who spends more time on pass coverage, leads the Huskers in interceptions.

But there are situations when you can look at Nebraska’s defense and wonder if Shanle and Green have switched positions.

“You hear a lot of stuff like, ‘Well, where was the safety on that play?’ Well, I wasn’t a safety on that play, I was rolled up in the box that time,” Shanle said. “Or there’s a lot of times where people are confused by whether a corner or a safety messed up. In our system, if you’re running quarters, it’s not just a drop-back, two-high scheme any more. You can be, but you can do a lot of things that help you in a quarters system.

“The thing that’s complicated about a quarters system is the change that you make week to week, based on the team you’re facing. You can play quarters all across the board, quarter-quarter-halves. Then, you can maybe go to cover-3 and roll a safety down. Based off what the offense gives you and what the coaches like to do against a certain team, every week you’re playing something different. You never really come back to playing basics, unless you’re at practice and you’re playing your offense. It’s just a great defense, because you’re never really playing the same thing week after week.”

Texas Tech coach Mike Leach, whose offense features what’s considered to be the most innovative passing game in college, can appreciate why teams seem to be playing a lot more cover-2 defense.

“It has flexibility,” he said.

Added Shanle, “You want a guy that can come down and fill in the run playing strong safety. But in our system, the strong safety is still going to be responsible for covering receivers. They’ve called our defense a brother-sister defense, to where on any given play, if the offense readjusts their sets, I become a strong safety and Tierre becomes a free. We have the same things going across the field (so) you’re playing both positions.”

Which makes the safeties a lot more important to the overall defensive scheme.

“Absolutely,” Stoops said. “But I would say we have always felt that it’s one of the more critical positions. We’ve had that mind-set for a long time.”

Reach Curt McKeever at 473-7441 or cmckeever@journalstar.com.