PITTSBURGH — An old acquaintance of Phil Elmassian greeted the Nebraska secondary coach outside the Nebraska locker room Saturday afternoon.

The man wearing Pittsburgh attire told Elmassian, a former assistant coach with three Big East Conference teams, that the Huskers had a great defense.

"Yeah," Elmassian said, "we'll, we're not bad."

He spoke modestly, yet confidently, about the Blackshirts' performance in Nebraska's 24-17 victory against Pittsburgh.

There was no hint of concern in his voice. No worries whatsoever from a coach that came to town with only one of his two starting cornerbacks, then saw that one player get hurt in the second quarter and sit out the second half.

"What are you going to do? Call the game? Stop the game?" Elmassian said, matter-of-factly. "We can't make it a big deal. It's our living. It's our livelihood, it's what we do.

"That's why you've got kids on scholarship. You let them play, get it done. And I'm serious. If you go down in your job, somebody's going to take your place, aren't they?"

When junior Fabian Washington left the game with a knee injury in the second quarter, it left the Huskers with a true freshman, Cortney Grixby, at one corner, and a former walk-on, Kellen Huston, at the other.

A redshirted freshman, Titus Brothers, took Huston's place at nickel back and batted down Pittsburgh's last-second pass into the end zone to preserve the victory.

Senior Lornell McPherson, who left last week's game against Southern Mississippi with a hamstring injury, didn't travel with the team.

Grixby made his first career start in McPherson's place.

"When you lose your two starters … I know what you want me to say, ‘Oh, gee-whiz, it's a pain in the ass ,'" Elmassian said. "But you don't. Injury creates depth in the college game. People don't have depth. Nobody has depth. If you've got depth, sometimes your first string's not very good.

"When you have an injury, or two injuries, like we've had, where all of the sudden … and you were able to win the game … now, all of the sudden, we've got depth. That's a good thing, and hopefully we can carry it through."

Last week, Grixby tangled his feet and fell while covering the Southern Miss receiver who caught the eventual game-winning touchdown. This time, the Husker freshman kept his footing but still found himself answering questions about Pittsburgh's lone offensive touchdown.

It came one play after Nebraska's only turnover of the game, a fourth-quarter interception by Joe Dailey. From the NU 34-yard line, Pitt quarterback Tyler Palko pump-faked and lofted the ball toward the end zone to wide receiver Greg Lee.

Grixby was covering. Tightly. Lee still managed to catch the ball for a touchdown.

"It was just a great catch by the receiver," Grixby said. "I was there, and there really wasn't nothing I could do. I tried, and he made a great catch."

Elmassian said he and the coaching staff should take the blame on the play for playing man defense in the sudden-change situation.

"We should've been in a cover-two or cover-three," Elmassian said. "We should've either blitzed them or played a zone."

As for Grixby's performance?

"A great job. Outstanding," Elmassian said. "The young man's got a lot of upside qualities as a freshman. You hate to play him. You'd like to redshirt him. But he's ready. They wanted him to do it, and we wanted him to do it, and we're glad we did, because we needed him."

Elmassian also said Huston and Brothers performed admirably.

Not everybody in the secondary was green, though. The Bullocks twins, Josh and Daniel, were in normal form at their safety positions.

Josh, who intercepted 10 passes last season, picked off his first pass of this season, returning the ball 38 yards in the second quarter.

Daniel broke up two passes and sacked Palko for a 12-yard loss.

But it was performances by Grixby and Huston that most impressed Josh Bullocks.

"They stepped up to adversity, and that's what you'd expect from players when you're down in tough situations, especially in an away game," Bullocks said. "They're just tough guys who came through for us. They just showed that they have good character and they can handle adversity."

The extent of Washington's injury won't be known until today, coaches said. McPherson's status is also uncertain, although the Huskers have two weeks before playing Kansas.

"Hopefully, Lornell will be back and be rested, but if he's not, I'm going to be ready," Grixby said. "(Coaches) have been prepping us well in practice. We've gotten a lot of reps. The coaches have just done a real good job preparing us for this."

Reach Brian Rosenthal at 473-7436 or brosenthal@journalstar.com.