Just when the Houston Rockets had things rolling with 12 straight wins and looked like a serious threat to the other Western Conference powers, one of the their superstars went down with a serious injury.

 And guess what? This time is wasn’t Tracy McGrady.

 Yao Ming is done for the season with a stress fracture in his left foot, and likely so are the Rockets, who had pulled themselves into a playoff spot and were a serious threat under new coach Rick Adelman. Now 22 points and 10.8 rebounds are gone and the Rockets are left with a 7-foot-7 hole in the middle of their lineup.

Now with only 26 games left and the West loaded, Houston will be hard pressed to even hold on to a playoff spot with the creaky Dikembe Mutombo as their only big-man option, much less make a dent in the postseason. The trade deadline has past with only free agents and buyout candidates now left as viable fall-back plans.

 The loss of Yao might also take the Rockets out of the Brent Barry sweepstakes. There were reports Monday that the Rockets were making a hard push for Barry, but that was before tests on Yao revealed the bad news.

 Barry is expected to choose between Boston, Phoenix and San Antonio today, but there are indications that the Celtics would rather have Sam Cassell if, as expected a buyout is worked out with the Clippers today.

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