At about 8 o'clock this morning, a long, sleek bus will roll through the streets of South Central Los Angeles and pull up in front of a home on East 85th Street. It would, on most days, look a little out of place in a neighborhood reputed to be one of the nation's roughest, the home of gangs, violence and some of life's biggest horror stories.

This isn't one of them.

Today, Baron Davis is home and life will have just a little more flavor for the kids in the area. It's always that way, it seems, when Davis goes back to a place he says he can never really leave.

Davis, the Charlotte Hornets' point guard with a rapidly rising NBA game, appears well on his way to becoming an All-Star. It's a status he might already have in South Central.

The bus will take the kids on an NBA field trip. There's Little Chuckie, Danny, Calvin and others, many of them as young as 8.

Davis will join them, first at the Hornets' shooting practice at Staples Center, where tonight Charlotte will play the Clippers at 9. After practice, they'll go to the Hornets' hotel for a pizza party, mingle with players and coaches, then return to Staples for the game.

"We first planned for 25 kids," Davis said Saturday. "It might be as many as 50 by the time it's over with, including some from other neighborhoods."

They will be accompanied by a group from Unity One, a gang prevention program whose counselors include former gang members from the neighborhood, many of them who long ago befriended Davis - and pushed him to maximize his basketball talents and move on to a more productive life beyond South Central.

By the time the kids get off the bus at the last stop, in front of the home of Lela Nicholson, the grandmother who raised Davis, they will have had a full day. One that Davis never had.

"It never happened with me or the guys I grew up with," Davis said. "The Forum, where the Lakers used to play, was 10 minutes from my house. And we never saw a Lakers game or a Clippers game. It was because of the price of the tickets and the transportation. We couldn't afford it."

That's why Davis, 22, spends time and in many cases money on the kids. He is footing the bill for today's game tickets, the bus and the food on the kids. When he returns to Los Angeles in the off-season he walks "about 50 steps" from Nicholson's house to South Park Elementary, his old school, and shoots hoops with the kids on 8-foot goals in the park. He speaks with pride of them and of his neighborhood, something that seems to run in his family. Last year, when Davis wanted to buy a house for his grandmother, she refused to leave South Central.

Saturday, her guests included Hornets players, coaches and others in their travel party.

"This neighborhood represents me and who I am as a person," Davis said. "That was with a lot of hard work and the help of people in this neighborhood.

"People may look at them in a bad light, but they always encouraged me to do those things. I remember a guy who was a crackhead...I hate to say it that way but that's what he was...who beat me playing basketball like three times in a row. He kept pushing me and making me work on my game.

"Even though they're not in the best of situations and life has dealt them a bad hand, they've dealt that hand to themselves in a lot of cases. But they want to see people from the neighborhood succeed. I do, too.

"These are the kids who are always coming around my grandmother's house during the summer. I play ball with them. I try to make sure their grades are good, that they're doing the right things. I always tell them I'm going to look out for them." Davis