So how was your night?

Sometime in July, when the Yankees have an off night and all the networks are running episodes of my favorite shows for the third time, I'll remember last night. In descending order of caring, my interests were:

1. Bruins-'Canes (Seventh game, naturally)
2. Celtics-Magic (chance to advance in the playoffs)
3. Yankees-Blue Jays (because, come on)
4. Rockets-Lakers (Watching the Lakers wrestle with a team that, currently comprised, would not make the playoffs in the West in one of the pleasanter surprises of the spring)
5. What happened to Izzy on Grey's Anatomy (Astro-Girl's favorite show and, as Samuel L. Jackson said in Pulp Fiction, "My girlfriend's a vegetarian, which pretty much means I'm a vegetarian.")
6. If Meredith and McDreamy finally hooked up.

All this, while contending with:

1. A TV in the den stuck on a channel, it seems, that aired nothing but back-to-back showings of the David Hasselhoff made-for-TV movie Layover.

2. The Bruins game nowhere to be found. Last month, we seemed we had NESN. Now, not so much. And the Red Wings were hogging Versus. I mean, I'm old enough to remember friggin' Curt Gowdy call the Bruins-Rangers Cup Finals on NBC.

3. My lack of knowledge of about the last seven episodes of Gray's Anatomy. (Wait, is that "Grey" with an a or an e? I sort of got distracted since the chubby one went lesbo--and, as I recall, showed extreme skill.

So. What do we take away from last night?

A busted silverware drawer. When Paul Pierce missed two free throws in a row, essentially handing the game to the Magic and sending the series to game seven, I slammed the drawer so hard, the front popped out.

A potential Dan-and-Dave moment. I laughed out loud the first time I saw the Nike Kobe-and-LeBron-as-puppets commercial. Everyone outside greater Houston, Denver, Boston and Orlando seems to want . . . but more important, expect . . . a Cleveland-Laker final. But LA, as they're playing right now, can't beat Denver.

A chance to party like it's 1999. Yanks last night: strong starting pitching (enough to keep it close), timely hitting late, then Mo. Fellas, is that so hard?

A letdown on "Grey's Anatomy." The problem with series-leavings on network TV shows is that we've already been told via Entertainment Tonight and its various outlets. Mark Harmon on St. Elsewhere, Ed Marinaro on Hill Street Blues, Shelley Long on Cheers: the only suspense is how it's going to happen.

A sense of doom. Was it me, or were the Bruins, in overtime, just delaying the inevitable? Since the days of Brad Park and Rick Middleton, the onlt Bruins I could tell you about were Sergei Samsanov and Joe Thornton--both of whom the Bruins, sticking to their post-Park game plan, traded years ago. So there was Samsanov in a 'Canes uniform last night, in the middle of every rush toward the puck. The Bruins, at the end, were just hanging on.

Laughs. This Rocket team--missing both its first- and second-string center, its most talented player, sporting a center three inches shorter than Magic Johnson and a point guard (Aaron Brooks) who sounds like he plays quarterback for Oregon State--will not win the NBA championship. But after last night's victory against the Lakers, they will, in Houston, always be loved.