Pittsburgh Pirates

The Pittsburgh Pirates were an American professional ice hockey team in the National Hockey League (NHL), based in Pittsburgh from 1925–26 to 1929–30. The nickname comes from the baseball team also based in the city. For the 1930–31 season, the team moved to Philadelphia, and played one season as the Philadelphia Quakers. Franchise history Early days The Pittsburgh Pirates are traced back to the Pittsburgh Yellow Jackets of the United States Amateur Hockey Association. The Yellow Jackets, under manager Roy Schooley and coach Dick Carroll, won back-to-back USAHA championships in the league's last two seasons, 1923–24 and 1924–25. The players on this team formed the core of a newly professional Pittsburgh club that was granted a franchise by the National Hockey League on November 7, 1925. Pittsburgh's admission to the NHL came after Eddie Livingstone, the former owner of the Toronto Shamrocks and the Toronto Blueshirts of the National Hockey Association saw Pittsburgh as a possible member for a proposed rival league to the NHL; Pittsburgh had, in the 1890s, been the first metropolitan area to professionalize the game of ice hockey. In order to thwart the new league, the President of the NHL, Frank Calder, negotiated to put a franchise in Pittsburgh, which became the seventh team to join the NHL as well as the league's third US-based team. The team took the name Pittsburgh Pirates after receiving permission from Barney Dreyfuss, the owner of the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team. The Pirates were assigned to what would later be called the NHL's American Division, with the Boston Bruins and the New York Americans. These two franchises were the only other American teams in the NHL at the time. Duquesne Garden, located in the city's Oakland neighborhood, served as the team's home arena. Duquesne Garden president Henry Townsend was the club's president and owner. The Pirates, dubbed the "Mighty Steel City Sextet" in the Pittsburgh Press, were mostly leftovers from the former Pittsburgh Yellow Jackets. Ten former Yellow Jacket players would play for the Pirates.