Devin Leary Learning to Adjust to Life Under Center

Devin Leary has thrown plenty of passes throughout his lengthy college career, 568 to be precise. Most of those plays started with the quarterback lined up in a shotgun formation. That will not always be the case at Kentucky. He’s re-learning how to take snaps under center and hand the ball off to his running backs at the Wildcats’ spring practice.

“Just operating under center, that was something he hadn’t done,” offensive coordinator Liam Coen said Tuesday. “It’s very similar to when I first got here, Joey (Gatewood) and Beau (Allen), that hand’t really operated underneath the center. Just to take the snap and execute a handoff is new. It sounds pretty elementary to us, but when you don’t do it and you’re not used to operating that way, it is difficult.”

Learning the footwork and repping the process is tedious, albeit necessary. After all, if Leary wants to excel at the next level, he’ll have to take snaps under center on Sundays. That’s part of the reason why he chose to transfer to Kentucky, to play in the Wildcats’ pro-style system. So far, there have not been many hiccups with clean exchanges between the quarterback, center and running backs.

“It’s a little bit of a learning curve,” Leary said. “I’ve done it in the past. It’s just more so frequently getting more snaps under center. I think it’s all about getting more reps under my belt and I’m having fun with it.”

In addition to learning the footwork, there’s also a new element for Leary to adapt to in the play-action pass game.

“Turning your back to the defense, it’s something when you play in the gun you typically don’t do that often, as opposed to when we are underneath the center and play-action, you turn your back to the defense. Sometimes the picture can change. Being able to process that a little bit faster, that’s been a different thing for him,” said Coen.

Even though it’s a different process, Devin Leary is taking it all in stride. Liam Coen has a different offense than Tim Beck, but football is still football and Leary is enjoying every bit of it in Lexington.

“It’s a little bit different. It’s definitely a little more pro-style,” said Kentucky’s new quarterback. “We’ve had the ability to get under center a little bit more in this offense and do a little more play-action, but I think a lot of offenses have very similar schemes, it’s just about he new terminology.”