Possible Clues:

• With due deference to the step, it's a soft one
• Manifest nervousness
• New York university
• Word hidden backwards in this puzzle's eight longest answers
• New York university whose athletes are the Setters
• Speed of a step?
• University with a campus in lower Manhattan
• Pick it up if you're behind
• Man with good numbers perhaps turns up in exercise march
• Speed; a step