They’re Home, but They’re Not Alone : UC Irvine: Coach Rod Baker and transfer Lloyd Mumford expect a happy return to mark team’s season opener tonight against Boston University.

The bus ride from Logan Airport to the hotel was enough for Lloyd Mumford and Coach Rod Baker to know they were home.

“Coming from Logan, you go past the toll booth and through the Callahan Tunnel. Once you go through the Callahan Tunnel, there’s a sense of being home,” said Mumford, a transfer from Villanova who will make his UC Irvine debut tonight against Boston University, perhaps 20 minutes from his family home in the Boston neighborhood of Mattapan. “It was nice to feel the cold air, that made me feel like I was home.”

Baker is a Philadelphia native, but he attended Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., and his first job as a head coach was at nearby Tufts, where he spent five years. On the way in from the airport, he rode past Massachusetts General Hospital, where his son, Zachary, now 4, was born.

It was at Tufts, where Irvine will hold its pregame practice today, that Baker and Mumford first encountered each other. The acquaintance turned out to be the beginning of a twisting path that led the point guard to Irvine.

Mumford’s uncle and guardian, Harry Wilson, is a basketball referee who sometimes would take Mumford along when he worked games. “Yeah, when I was little, I would shoot on the side, myself and my little brother,” Mumford said. “Coach Baker would give us a ball, and we would shoot during the game. I don’t know if they won or lost, we weren’t paying attention.”

By the time he was a student at Lexington High School, where he was part of a program in which inner-city students were transferred to the suburbs, Mumford was a star player. He once scored 63 points against Cambridge Rindge & Latin, the school Patrick Ewing attended, and he helped lead a summer league team to the title of the Boston Shootout, a national tournament played in the same arena he’ll play in tonight.

Mumford played one season at Villanova before being kicked off the team by Rollie Massimino, now coach at Nevada Las Vegas. Mumford was awaiting trial on suspicion of attempting to break into two suburban Philadelphia homes when he was dismissed from the team. He later was cleared of all charges except misdemeanor disorderly conduct.

After a few phone conversations, he and Baker were reunited in Irvine.

“I didn’t really remember how he looked,” Mumford said. “As soon as I saw him, I felt comfortable. I remembered him and felt like I knew him. I think it’s a special relationship because he knew me and knows where I’m from, my background. I can really trust him like I can’t trust anybody else. With my past experience and the bad things that have happened, it’s really hard for me to open up to a coach.”

Baker is concerned Mumford might put too much pressure on himself tonight, when Mumford expects a group of 40 or 50 people, mostly family, to cheer him on.

“It’s just that he’s got so much that he wants to prove,” Baker said. “Whether he verbalizes that or not, he has to feel that way. He’s a normal human being. He wants to prove he’s a good player. He wants to be successful in front of his family and friends. That’s a lot to handle.

“It’s not a problem, him wanting to do well. If it happens, fine. It’s when it’s not going well and you start to try too hard that it becomes a problem.”

Mumford says he is aware of the potential for getting overworked, and he has worked on resisting the temptation to go too fast.

“I feel good. I feel I finally get a chance to play in front of my family the way I’ve always wanted to,” he said. “A lot of things have happened in my past, being hurt and transferring. I’m comfortable now at Irvine with Coach Baker. Now I can go play like I can play. I have the chance.”