They say you can never go home.

John Blake and Kevin Devonish figured out a long time ago that home is where you make it, and home is now Portland, Ore.

But they are Boston guys. Blake grew up in the Academy Homes projects in Roxbury. Devonish grew up about 2 miles away, around Intervale Street in Grove Hall.

They grew up in neighborhoods where forces would normally keep them apart, but basketball brought them together. And, in the end, the hard work and discipline that basketball demanded of them gave them greater insight into themselves and where they wanted to go.

In the late 1980s, John Blake and Kevin Devonish were among the best schoolboy players in Boston. Blake played at East Boston High. Devonish played at Burke High School.

They played together on AAU teams, and it was that bond that saved John Blake one night at the Chez Vous roller skating rink in 1989. Some kids from the Intervale gang were closing in on Blake because he was from Academy Homes, and it didn’t look good. Devonish intervened, pulling Blake to the door, whispering one word in his ear: Run.

It was a wild time in the late 1980s, when crack was king and Boston’s street gangs were in full bloom. Blake and Devonish decided they needed a change of scenery.

When Kilgore Junior College in Texas came calling, Blake was all in. But Kilgore got a package deal, because Devonish went out, too.

That experiment, getting a pair of Boston boys out of a tough inner-city environment for immersion in small-town Texas, was the subject of a long, evocative piece in the Globe by the incomparable Jackie MacMullan in 1990, under the headline: “Of Friends, Gangs & Second Chances.’’ The story ended with uncertainty. You were left to guess whether Blake and Devonish would cut it. Here is where the story picks up again.

It turns out the experiment worked. Blake and Devonish played on the best Kilgore team ever. Good enough to move up to play Division 1 ball, they moved together, as a team of two, to the University of South Alabama.

After graduating, Blake played professional basketball in Ireland (for the Burgerland Neptunes in Cork) and Spain.

Devonish played pro ball in Mexico and Yugoslavia before blowing out his knee. He moved to Portland because a friend had signed with the Trail Blazers in the NBA. He fell in love with the city and the great Northwest.

After his playing days were over, Blake came back to Boston, to work at Lesley University. But his old friend beckoned, and Devonish persuaded him to give Portland a try. They were always a team. They played on a traveling comedy basketball team, with the great Curly Neal and Meadowlark Lemon.

“That was fun, but at some point Kev and I knew we had to get real jobs,’’ Blake said.

Eventually, they found their calling, working with vulnerable and troubled kids. Blake works at a juvenile detention facility and also drives veterans to VA facilities. Devonish works for the state of Oregon in child protective services.

Blake and Devonish are living, breathing, empathetic exemplars of redemption. The road they took wasn’t always smooth. There were detours. But now, in their mid-40s, they have found their niche, and they always see a little of themselves in the kids they help.

“The upbringing that Kevin and I had, the streets we grew up in, the kids we work with have seen the same things. The kids I work with, they’re mostly gang members, living on welfare, no hope. They say to me, ‘You don’t know.’ I say we know what bottom is. Selling drugs to buy shoes. But I tell these kids, Kev tells those kids, we came up out of it doing it the right way, and you can, too.’’

On more than one occasion, Blake has shown an old copy of Jackie MacMullan’s story to a skeptical kid. The kids always read the story, from beginning to end.

Devonish, a rising star in the coaching ranks, coaches a high school team. But his day job, working with Portland’s most vulnerable kids, keeps him grounded.

“It’s more than a job,’’ Devonish says. “It’s about helping kids and families.’’

Devonish still talks to Al Holland, the longtime Burke headmaster who is trying to help Boston Latin School find its groove again, and Abner Logan, his high school basketball coach. He and Blake stay in touch with Shawn Scanlan, their coach at Kilgore.

“I never forget the people who helped me along the way,’’ Devonish said.

Blake feels the same way.

“Kev and I had to do it on our own, but without people who believed in us, who believed in second chances, this doesn’t happen,’’ Blake said. “It’s a lesson I carry through life.’’

Some of their childhood friends ended up in jail or prison, but Devonish said he is struck by how much those men have changed, for the better.

“ Guys I ran the streets with, a lot of them went to jail. Some are still in jail. But the ones who are out are doing well and doing things the right way. I believe in redemption.’’

Blake and Devonish wanted to update their story from 26 years ago, hoping one kid in Boston who is where they used to be might read it.

“We never made it to the NBA, which was our dream,’’ Blake says. “But we found a path.’’

They still come home to Boston to see family and friends. But this weekend, they are in Texas, because John Blake and Kevin Devonish were inducted into the Kilgore Junior College Hall of Fame. Devonish was looking forward to going back to Texas with his old bud.

“I never thought we’d be in the same ZIP code all these years later,’’ Devonish said. “But it’s a good thing. A beautiful thing.’’

It is a beautiful thing. There has never been a stronger team of two.

Kevin Cullen is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at cullen@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @GlobeCullen.