Anyone remember who had the best record in the West last season? It wasn’t Shaq, Kobe, and the dysfunctional Lakers. The efficient Spurs? A close second. Dallas? Denied. Sacramento? Sorry, Governator.

Under the radar, it was the Minnesota Timberwolves who grabbed the top seed in the West, making it all the way to the conference finals in a season that’s been largely forgotten outside of Derek Fisher’s shot in San Antonio and the Pistons’ upset in the Finals.

It hasn’t been forgotten in the Land o’ Lakes, however, and T-wolves fans expected more of the same entering this season. With reigning MVP Kevin Garnett reunited with last year’s entire crew and performers like Wally Szczerbiak, Michael Olowokandi, and Troy Hudson returning from injury-plagued seasons, the T-wolves believed they had enough firepower to win a championship. That perception explains why Minnesota’s 16-13 start is viewed as a colossal disappointment in the Twin Cities.

Minnesota’s troubles are puzzling because the team made no major changes to the machinery that rolled to a conference-best 58 wins last season. Garnett, Sam Cassell, and Latrell Sprewell remain the key cogs, and the only significant departure (stretching the word “significant” to its limits here) was reserve forward Gary Trent.

Leaving the roster unchanged may have been the T-wolves’ first mistake. Standing pat can be beneficial because it allows a unit to jell, but Minnesota had obvious deficiencies at the center spot that weren’t addressed over the summer. Instead, the organization used its free-agent money to keep its reserve point guard, Hudson, and a defensive specialist, Trenton Hassell. The only major addition, frontcourt reserve Eddie Griffin, came about almost by accident, with Minnesota taking an inexpensive roll of the dice on the troubled youngster.

Sticking with the same roster hurt the T-wolves because age is catching up with several key performers. Cassell is 35, Sprewell is 34, and Ervin Johnson is 37; they make up three fifths of last season’s starting lineup. All three played at the upper limits of their abilities a year ago, meaning they were ripe for a crash.

Cassell had the best season of his career in 2003-04, making the All-Star team for the first time, but he’s dropped 2.5 points off his 40-minute average and is shooting at a lower percentage. Sprewell’s numbers are down by 1.4 points per 40 minutes. Johnson, meanwhile, has been ushered out of the rotation because his occasional fits of defense no longer support his anemic offensive output.

Nor has the trio’s decline been offset by the returns of Szczerbiak, Hudson, and Olowokandi. That Olowokandi hasn’t lived up to expectations hardly needs mentioning at this point in his disappointing career, but the T-wolves steadfastly tried starting him at center to begin the season and suffered the inevitably disappointing result. The Kandi Man has as many turnovers as free-throw attempts, and looks completely disoriented on defense.

Hudson, meanwhile, hasn’t let his 37% shooting stop him from firing away at nearly every opportunity. His play has been so spotty that he’s in danger of losing his backup point guard job to uber-retread Anthony Carter.

Szczerbiak, though, has been a bright spot, averaging 19 points per 40 minutes on 50% shooting as Hassell’s replacement in the starting lineup. His impact shows in Minnesota’s improved Offensive Efficiency (my measure of a team’s points per 100 possessions). Last year’s mark of 103.8 roared up to 107.6 this season, the NBA’s fourth-best mark.

So if the offense is better, that means defense must be the culprit. Minnesota was one of the best defensive teams in basketball in 2003-04, ranking sixth in the NBA with a Defensive Efficiency of 97.3. That’s all gone by the wayside in the new campaign, with the T-wolves plummeting to 103.5 – a full point-and-a-half below the league average.

Several changes are responsible for the massive decline. First, while replacing Hassell with Szczerbiak has had obvious offensive benefits, there’s a cost to be paid at the defensive end. Hassell is Minnesota’s best defender, and his decline in minutes hurts Minnesota at that end of the floor. Coach Flip Saunders has traded defense for offense at the center spot as well, often using Griffin in the middle instead of a more traditional wide body like Olowokandi, Johnson, or Mark Madsen.

Yet Minnesota’s biggest problem lies in the backcourt. With a combined age of 69, Sprewell and Cassell were bound to have some problems keeping up with younger, quicker foes. Worse, opponents can now expose the duo’s slowness on a nightly basis thanks to the league’s crackdown on bumping and hand-checking on the perimeter, which takes away the main weapon a slow defender has against a quicker ballhandler.

The bad karma emanating from both players probably hasn’t helped their defensive effort, either. Sprewell is in the last year of his contract, while Cassell has two years left, and both have whined loudly about their need for an extension.

Fortunately, there’s a silver lining in the Timberwolves’ story. For starters, their record isn’t quite as bad as it looks because they’ve been unlucky in close games. Their point differential should have earned them an 19-10 record instead of 16-13; over the course of a season that would put them at 52-30. Plenty of teams would love to be in that position.

More important, their main weakness is easily overcome. With opposing guards beating Minnesota repeatedly, the obvious solution is to get Hassell back in the starting lineup. Here’s the kicker: There’s no need to put him in for Szczerbiak, who has been a reliable second option behind Garnett.

Instead, Saunders should send Sprewell to the pine. Knowing Spree, he’ll go ballistic, but as long as he doesn’t re-enact his P.J. Carlesimo routine, the T-wolves can live with it. If not, Sprewell’s ending contract could be a delectable treat at the trade deadline for a team looking to unload some longer contracts on Minnesota.

Taking the long-term view, while the T-wolves’ sluggish start is an obvious disappointment, it needn’t impede their long-term goal of winning the Western Conference in June. They still have the best player in basketball, and the offensive weapons around him have only improved. If Saunders can make some moves to return the defense to its previous high standards, there’s still time for this story to have a happy ending.