Mario Buford holds the NB · Backup spot in Nebraska Cornhuskers’s safety room. Where he sits among the room’s front-line roles:

Mario Buford is a 6'0", 185-pound nickelback for Nebraska, currently a redshirt sophomore from Chicago, Illinois. He attended DeSoto High School in Texas, where he recorded 42 tackles as a senior on a 15-0 team that won the 6A D-II state championship. As a true freshman in 2024, Buford appeared in 11 games and totaled eight tackles, including three against Northern Iowa, two at Purdue, and two at Indiana with his first pass breakup. He redshirted in 2025 after playing in two games. A four-star recruit and child, youth and family studies major, Buford is an Academic All-Big Ten honoree and Arthur Ashe Jr. Sports Scholar.

Nebraska2024 — present