5 Minnesota Timberwolves

Ten-year veteran Sam Cassell maybe lacking in some departments, chief among them hair and a conscience when shooting, but confidence is not one of them. To hear the Timberwolves' new point guard tell it, the key to this team will be, yep, Sam Cassell. "Every team I'm on has an attitude," he says. "I'm very competitive. I'm bringing that to this squad."

His competitiveness helped the Bucks reach the playoffs in three of the five seasons he was in Milwaukee, though they never went to the Finals. Now he joins a club that has suffered seven consecutive first-round exits from the postseason and is counting on him and fellow newcomers Latrell Sprewell and Michael Olowokandi to get it over the hump.

All-Star forward Kevin Garnett is wearing a big smile these days primarily because, he says, the new back-court combination of Cassell and Troy Hudson "makes us, at times, unstoppable because the break is going so fast."

Cassell, who averaged 19.0 points per game over the last four seasons, scoffs at the notion that he has to modify his game now that he's playing in a system with so many other potent scorers. "I don't have to change a damn thing," he says. "I just play my game." What about a potential point guard controversy with Hudson? "In the half-court, I'm the point guard," says Cassell with finality. "We play well together, but I'm running the point."

Cassell likens the Timberwolves to the championship teams he played on in Houston in the mid-1990s. Minnesota has two capable big men in Garnett and Olowokandi, scoring firepower, a strong bench, a veteran coach and a floor general unafraid to take big shots. "All the pieces are there," says Cassell. "This is a team that can go all the way."