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Terrell Farley played in 20 games as a Nebraska linebacker. The Huskers won them all, by an average margin of 41.1 points, including a 62-24 clobbering of Florida for the 1995 national championship.

So a 51-7 win against Missouri in 1996 rated as another checked box for Nebraska. But one play on that blustery November afternoon at Memorial Stadium symbolized for former teammate Jay Foreman the mystique of Farley in what was ultimately his second-to-last game with the Huskers.

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Leading 16-0 late in the first half, Nebraska earned a defensive stop deep in Mizzou territory. Eric Warfield blocked Jason Smith’s punt, and the ball fluttered forward before bouncing oddly straight to Farley, who ran untouched 9 yards for a touchdown as Foreman watched in bewilderment.

“The way that ball bounced, it was the funniest shit ever,” said Foreman, who saw the ball carom off Warfield’s hands and gauged his own position near the middle of the line as perfect for a scoop-and-score recovery. “But that’s Terrell. He was Johnny-on-the-spot. He was a ballplayer, man.

“He came out of juco blocking punts and making plays.”

And that’s what Farley did for the better part of two seasons at Nebraska.

He pushed his way into the lineup midway through 1995 on one of the most dominant teams in college football history. Farley was named the defensive newcomer of the year in the Big Eight and to the AP All-America second team. Undersized as a 205-pound weakside linebacker, he led Nebraska in tackles and returned two of three interceptions for touchdowns while recording five sacks, five pass breakups and 12 QB hurries.

“I felt like I had to prove myself to everyone when I was out there,” Farley said in a wide-ranging interview this month.

He was just as disruptive as a senior on the top-ranked defense nationally — until, that is, he was gone, kicked off the team by coach Tom Osborne for a second drunk-driving arrest.

Farley disappeared from Lincoln for nearly 20 years. He played two seasons in the Canadian Football League and settled in his home state of Georgia, battling alcohol and drug problems as he accumulated a substantial criminal record and had multiple stints in jail.

In 2015, Farley sought help from Osborne. Farley, 44, now sober for five years, he said, works in Lincoln as the director of a janitorial crew. He’s bolstered by support from a network of former Huskers and reunited with a fan base from which he felt detached.

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“I guess it was time to come out of the closet and just face everything,” Farley said.

At the time of Farley’s second arrest in 1996, the Huskers climbed back to fourth nationally after a September loss at Arizona State snapped a 26-game winning streak for the back-to-back national champs who had been the preseason No. 1.

Farley was suspended from that Week 3 trip to the desert in addition to the season opener, a 55-14 win against Michigan State. Osborne told Farley if he had any more trouble, he was done.

“He had some trouble,” the former coach recalled this week, “and we dismissed him. It came at a really bad time.”

Without Farley, the Huskers edged No. 5 Colorado, but his absence proved costly against big-underdog Texas in the first Big 12 championship. Concerned about the Longhorns’ ability to throw to running back Priest Holmes, the Huskers moved star safety Mike Minter to Farley’s linebacker spot.

Warfield, filling Minter’s role, was injured during the game. It left Eric Stokes, playing with a high fever, to man a key spot.

Texas scored two late touchdowns and threw for 353 yards in a 37-27 win, the highest point total allowed by Nebraska since the 1991 Citrus Bowl. The loss robbed the Huskers of a postseason rematch from three years prior against Florida State, with a shot to play for another title.

Farley had “no doubt,” he said, that his presence could have made the difference against Texas.

“I really felt like I let my guys down,” he said. “It hurt. I think about it and say, ‘Damn, we could have done this; we could have done that.’ But sometimes you don’t want to dwell too much on the past.”

Farley’s struggle with alcohol abuse, he said, began as he attended high school in Columbus, Ga. It followed him to Nebraska and back home in his post-football life.

Farley most recently served an eight-month prison sentence in 2013 and 2014, according to records in Georgia, for a battery conviction and probation violation. His record includes various alcohol- and drug-related arrests in Georgia in addition to convictions on criminal trespassing, simple assault and shoplifting.

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After accepting an invitation late in 2014 to visit Nebraska for an autograph-signing event, Farley was surprised that fans were excited to see him, considering how his career ended in disappointment. He said he wondered whether Lincoln could present him a fresh start.

“He called,” Osborne said, “and I could tell he was not in a good place. I could tell he was searching for something. I told him I’d be glad to help. We never turn our backs on anybody.”

Osborne, on behalf of Farley, contacted Ricky Simmons, a former Nebraska receiver whose drug addiction destroyed his professional football career and landed him in prison in Texas. Simmons said he’d been clean since 2009. He remade his life in Lincoln, he said, as a drug and alcohol counselor while starting a public-speaking organization to offer education about the perils of addiction.

“If Coach asks me, I’m doing it,” Simmons said. “He gave (Farley) my information, and Terrell showed up at my office one day. He seemed sincere, but a lot of people come to me who seem sincere. I laid it all out for him the first day. I was like, ‘Dude, if you want to do it, that’s cool. But you’re free to go.'”

Farley wanted to do it. For five years, Simmons and Farley said, they have spoken every day.

“And that’s to hold both of us accountable,” Simmons said. “I’m not at this place where I think I can fix the world. I need to hear his voice as much as he needs to hear mine.”

Farley described his relationship with Simmons as “like brothers.”

“Having somebody there for you who understands what you’re going through, it’s different than reading a book,” Farley said. “These are real-life battles.”

He maintained relationships, even through his dark days, with former teammates Tommie Frazier, Vershan Jackson and Eric Johnson and found community in Nebraska among other ex-Huskers Steve Taylor, Riley Washington, Keyuo Craver and Kenny Wilhite.

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“Time heals everything,” said Foreman, who settled in Lincoln after an eight-year NFL career. “It was 20-some years ago what happened. There are always players who’ve had their trials and are welcomed back with open arms. That’s Lincoln.

“And when you have to face up to it, that’s part of the healing process.”

Farley said his family in Georgia stood “100 percent” behind him upon the changes he made.

“They’re very proud of me,” he said. “I’m very proud of me. It makes me happy to see my dad finally happy that I got my life together.”

He said his son, Jeremiah, 16, and daughter, Jada, 13, spend time with him in Lincoln during the summer. Farley said he wants to take them soon to a game at Nebraska to show his kids more of the environment that aided in his transformation.

“I’m very grateful for it,” he said.

Farley said he tries to pay forward the assistance he’s received from Simmons and others. His advice when contacted on social media by people who’ve heard his story? Be committed. Go one day at a time. And be prepared to lose friends.

He said he talks with the 83-year-old Osborne about once a month.

“I give Coach Osborne the utmost respect because of everything he does for this community, the former players — really, the whole state of Nebraska,” Farley said. “The situation, how it went down, he did what was best for the team at the time.

“Once you make your bed, it’s time to lay in it. I took full responsibility. A mistake was made. I finally corrected it after 20-some years.”

Said Osborne: “He really has, as far as I can tell, made some significant changes in his life.”

After his 1996 dismissal, Farley received little attention from NFL teams. The Green Bay Packers offered him a chance to play cornerback. It didn’t work. Corner was not a “fair option” for Farley, Foreman said.

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If Farley had finished his senior season, perhaps he’d have been drafted and provided a better opportunity.

“But I really think he’s in a better place now for all he’s been through,” Foreman said.

According to Farley, “no hard feelings” remain. His regrets around football, in fact, involve other mistakes, such as the tipped Danny Wuerffel pass that he dropped on the second play of the 1996 Fiesta Bowl against the Gators. Farley had his eyes on the end zone.

“You’ve got to have the ball to run with it,” he said.

Despite his untimely departure from Nebraska, Farley’s style of play lit a path for linebackers such as Randy Stella and Demorrio Williams, even Lavonte David, a two-time All-American out of junior college at Nebraska who’s set to play his ninth NFL season this year.

“He was before his time,” Foreman said of Farley.

And seemingly in position, whether in the mid-’90s or two decades later, to capitalize on a fortunate bounce.

(Photo of Farley in 1995: Jed Jacobsohn / Getty Images)

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