It's time for Glen Taylor to clean house. This time, he should use a demolition unit instead of a feather duster.

Taylor, the Wolves' owner, has relied on cronies since he bought the team. In the wake of his team's heartless, hapless loss to a bad Golden State team missing its best player Tuesday, Taylor should be contemplating nuclear options.

If he's not going to have the good taste to fire himself, he's going to have to fire pretty much everyone else.

In their 20th year of existence, the Wolves still lack intelligent ownership, a savvy front office, talent, a productive scouting and drafting mechanism, and a culture promoting high standards.

What the Wolves need more than anything else is an organizational bouncer, someone who can cross his arms, glare at the regulars slumped against the bar and holler, "You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here."

Kevin McHale will have to be the first to go. Trying McHale as a coach for a second time made sense. He did good work in his first incarnation as a temp, and, after a slow start against premier competition, the players he acquired responded to the dismissal of Randy Wittman by compiling a 10-3 record under McHale against mediocre competition in January.

As a coach, though, McHale is better suited to speed-dating than marriage. He could cite Al Jefferson's injury as an excuse, but Wittman was fired, deservedly, because the players stopped competing for him. By that standard, Tuesday's game should be considered a fireable offense, especially considering McHale is failing with players he acquired and defended.

Tuesday's loss was the latest in a mind- boggling litany of signs that Taylor's piecemeal, consensus-building approach to fixing his franchise is not going to work. Taylor ruled out returning McHale to the front office, and the team's performance should rule out McHale returning to the bench.

The front office must be disbanded, and Taylor must hire a real general manager who has no connections to the franchise, someone who will start work with no incestuous relationships in place.

Ceding power to someone unfamiliar will be difficult for Taylor. If he wants to maintain a feeling of connection to the decision-making process and game-day preparations, he can hire a coach he admires, a coach with a connection to the Wolves' playoff years, a man who helped make Kevin Garnett the player he is today, a coach who would command respect and resonate with Minnesota's depressed basketball fans.

He should hire Sam Mitchell, the overachieving former Wolves player who became head coach of the Toronto Raptors.

The Raptors fired Mitchell this season when the team's record was 8-9. Since his departure, Toronto is 15-30.

Mitchell and Flip Saunders are the two most obvious candidates to replace McHale. Saunders' strengths were not developing players and instilling discipline, though, and what the Wolves need is a tough coach who can make young players better, who can instill high standards.

While Saunders is a capable NBA coach, Mitchell is better suited for the job at hand --providing fresh eyes and ideas for one of the worst-run franchises in sports.

Since Saunders left, Taylor has tried McHale (with some success), Dwane Casey (who looks like a comparative genius), Randy Wittman (who failed miserably) and McHale Redux (which worked for exactly one month).

Mitchell might be the most qualified head coach with NBA experience who would actually take this job.

Jim Souhan can be heard Sundays from 10 a.m.-noon on AM-1500 KSTP. • jsouhan@startribune.com