Pittsburgh Pirates ( NHL ) The Pittsburgh Pirates were a professional ice hockey team in the National Hockey League ( NHL ) , based in Pittsburgh , Pennsylvania from 1925 – 26 to 1929 – 30 . The nickname comes from the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team . For the 1930 – 31 season the team moved to Philadelphia , Pennsylvania and played one season as the Philadelphia Quakers . Franchise History . Early Days . The Pittsburgh Pirates ' history traces back to the Pittsburgh Yellow Jackets of the US Amateur Hockey Association . The Yellow Jackets ' owner was a former referee named Roy Schooley . Even though the team won the USAHA Championship in 1924 and 1925 , Schooley encountered financial problems . His team was purchased by attorney James F . Callahan . Callahan renamed the team the Pittsburgh Pirates , after he cashed in a favor from Barney Dreyfuss the owner of the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team . During this time , Eddie Livingstone was eyeing Pittsburgh as a city for his proposed rival league to the NHL , and Frank Calder negotiated to put a franchise in Pittsburgh to thwart this . This resulted in the Pirates being granted a franchise by the National Hockey League ( NHL ) on November 7 , 1925 , becoming the seventh team to join the NHL as well as the league ' s third US - based 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 . The only other American teams in the NHL were the Bruins ( 1924 – present ) and the New York Americans ( 1925 – 1942 ) . The Duquesne Gardens , located in the city ' s Oakland neighborhood , served as the team ' s home arena . The Pirates , dubbed the " Mighty Steel City Sextet " in the Pittsburgh Press , were comprised mostly of leftovers from the former Pittsburgh Yellow Jackets . Ten former Yellow Jacket players would play for the Pirates . The Inaugural season . The Pirates first season was the 1925 – 26 NHL season . On Thanksgiving night 1925 , the Pirates beat the Boston Bruins , 2 - 1 , on the road in their very first NHL game on November 26 , 1925 at the Boston Arena . Defenceman and captain Lionel Conacher scored Pittsburgh ' s first - ever NHL goal . Conacher beat Boston goaltender Charles Stewart at the 17 : 50 mark of the second period to tie the game at 1 - 1 . Pirates ' left wing Harold Darragh notched Pittsburgh ' s first game - winning goal 9 : 20 into the third period . While Pittsburgh goaltender Roy Worters stopped 26 of 27 shots to record the first win in franchise history . Two nights later , on November 28 , 1925 , the Pirates would stun the Montreal Canadiens . Legendary Habs goaltender , Georges Vezina , would play his final game in a 1 - 0 loss to the Pirates . Vezina had started the game with severe chest pains and left the game during the first intermission with a high fever . He died four months later from tuberculosis . The first NHL game ever played in Pittsburgh was on December 2 , 1925 in which 8 , 200 fans paid $ 1 . 00 to see the 8 : 30 p . m . faceoff at The Gardens . The Pirates lost to the New York Americans in overtime , 2 - 1 , and Conacher scored the lone goal for Pittsburgh at 9 : 15 of the second period . In 36 games , the Pirates had an impressive 19 wins , 16 losses , and 1 tie for third best in the league . With a 0 . 542 winning percentage , that first season would arguably be the team ' s best . They made the playoffs their inaugural year . The Pirates faced the Montreal Maroons in a best - of - three , semi - final Stanley Cup playoff series . However the team lost the series to Montreal in two straight games at the Duquesne Gardens . The Maroons would later win the Stanley Cup . 1926 - 1928 . After a good start to their franchise history , things went downhill from there . In their second season , 1926 – 1927 , the Pirates missed the playoffs after finishing in fourth place . The Pirates ' third season ( 1927 – 28 ) was that other season . In their third season , 1927 – 1928 , the Pirates had 19 wins , 17 losses , and 8 ties and made the playoffs . This playoff series would be based on a two game total goal series format . In the playoffs the Pirates would be beaten by the Rangers 6 - 4 . As their 4 - 2 win in Game 2 could not overcome a 4 - 0 white washing that they suffered in Game 1 . This marked the second time the team lost in the first round to the eventual Stanley Cup winner . It would turn out to be the last playoff game the Pirates would play . Decline . In 1928 financial problems forced the original owner , Callahan , to sell the team to an ownership group which included mobster Bill Dwyer with Boxing promoter and ex - lightweight boxing champion , Benny Leonard as his front man . Despite the sale of the team , things didn ' t improve on the ice . Cleghorn left the team at the end of the 1928 – 1929 season and became a referee in the league . This led to the Pirates to assign coaching duties to Frank Fredrickson in 1929 – 30 . The team also switched to black and orange uniforms for their fifth and what would be their final season . The 1929 – 30 season saw the Pirates achieve their worst win - loss record with 5 wins , 36 losses , and 3 ties in 44 games . In five seasons , they were above . 500 only twice and made the playoffs only twice . Things didn ' t improve financially either . With the stock market crash of 1929 followed by the Great Depression , the owners found themselves in financial difficulties . Attendance was down and they tried selling off their star players to make ends meet . The team was $ 400 , 000 in debt by the end of the 1929 – 30 season and in need to replace the aging Duquesne Gardens . Relocation . On October 18 , 1930 at the NHL Governors meeting , Leonard moved the team to the other side of Pennsylvania and renamed them the Philadelphia Quakers . However , Leonard ' s intention was to return the team to Pittsburgh as soon as a new arena was built . Thirteen players from the Pirates were transferred to the Philadelphia Quakers after Pittsburgh franchise relocated . These players were Cliff Barton , Harold Darragh , Herb Drury , Gord Frasier , Jim Jarvis , Gerry Lowrey , Rennison Manners , Johnny McKinnon , Hib Milks , Joe Miller , Rodger Smith & Tex White . Frank Fredrickson was also transferred to the Quakers , but he was released by Philadelphia two days later . The Quakers had a wretched season in 1930 – 31 . The team then received permission from the NHL on September 26 , 1931 to temporally cease operations as they sought a permanent arena in either Pittsburgh or Philadelphia . Meanwhile the poor economy was taking a toll on the entire league . The Great Depression would devastate the NHL as 4 teams were forced to fold , leaving behind just six teams . When a new Pittsburgh arena failed to materialize , Leonard surrendered his franchise in 1936 . As it turned out , a new arena in Pittsburgh wouldn ' t be built until the Pittsburgh Civic Arena ( now Mellon Arena ) opened in 1961 . The NHL would play with six teams for 25 years before deciding to expand . The expansion in 1967 brought the Pittsburgh Penguins to the NHL and the city of Pittsburgh and the orange and black uniformed Philadelphia Flyers to Philadelphia . The last active Pirates player was Cliff Barton , who played his last NHL game in 1940 . Historic firsts . The Pittsburgh Pirates have left their mark in the NHL record books and NHL history with many firsts and other notable achievements . Logos and uniforms . The Pirates were the first team in Pittsburgh to use the black & gold color scheme , basing their colors around the Flag of Pittsburgh ' s colors . Decades after the team folded , the colors have become the team colors of all three of Pittsburgh ' s major sports teams . However , during the team ' s existence , they would be the only team in the city with the colors , as the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team , like all other baseball teams at the time , had a more patriotic red , white , and blue color scheme and wouldn ' t adopt black & gold until 1948 . The NFL ' s Pittsburgh Steelers were not in existence until 1933 , three years after the team left town and two years after the franchise folded altogether . The Pirates would later have a connection with Pittsburgh ' s next NHL franchise ; the Pittsburgh Penguins used the Pirates as an example of a team other than the Boston Bruins using the black & gold color scheme when the Bruins protested to the NHL over the Penguins change in team colors in January 1980 . The NHL allowed the Penguins to change their colors as a result of the Pirates using these colors . The Pirates wore bright yellow wool jerseys with black trim stripes with a " P " on the front of their jerseys during the 1925 – 1926 season . The team used the Pittsburgh ' s city crest emblems from older police jackets on the uniform sleeves . Callahan ' s brother was a policeman in the city and offered the use of police emblems to the team . The first year jerseys appear to have been inherited from the Pittsburgh Yellow Jackets old jerseys . The Pirates featured new jerseys in 1928 – 29 that were gold with black striping . The word " Pirates " written in arched , blocked lettering . The city crest on the sleeves was replaced with a " P " . In 1929 – 30 the Pirates switched to black and orange uniforms for their fifth and final season . The wool jerseys featured a chain - knit logo of a pirate face with an eye patch and hat with skull and cross bones . The jersey featured double striping on the sleeves and a diagonal background behind the crest . The orange and black remained when the Pirates moved across the state to become the Quakers , Philadelphia ' s first NHL team , adopting script lettering like the original Pirates ' uniforms . When the Philadelphia Flyers joined the NHL in 1967 , they adopted the orange and black colors first worn by the Pirates and Quakers . Olympic winners . Members of the team who were also Olympics medalists 1920 . 1920 Olympic Games : Antwerp , Belgium 1924 . 1924 Olympic Games : Chamonix , France Season - by - season record . " Note : GP = Games played , W = Wins , L = Losses , T = Ties , Pts = Points , GF = Goals for , GA = Goals against , PIM = Penalties in minutes "