Pittsburgh Raiders

The Pittsburgh Raiders were an American professional basketball team based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. They had originally been known as the Pittsburgh Y.M.H.A. in their earliest existence back in 1931, to the point of even playing in the Midwest Basketball Conference's first two seasons under that same team name (even becoming a playoff team in their first season there) before becoming the Pittsburgh Pirates, in homage to the Major League Baseball team of the same name in 1937 once the MBC decided to rebrand itself into the National Basketball League. From there, the rebranded Pittsburgh Pirates franchise would play in the newly-rebranded NBL for two seasons (having a winning season in their first NBL season) before essentially folding operations and leaving the NBL in 1939, with them later coming back into the NBL in 1944 as the Pittsburgh Raiders. With their inclusion alongside that of the Chicago American Gears for the 1944–45 NBL season, the NBL (which was operating at a historically low four teams in its previous season) would decide that they'd be comfortable to return to utilizing divisional play for their seasons once again after previously not using divisions since the 1940–41 NBL season. Unfortunately for the Raiders, their season would see them be the weakest team competing in the entire league, as they finished their only season under that name with a 7–23 record before leaving the NBL altogether. While the NBL would later try to entice the Raiders to come back to the NBL a season later in 1946, their position in the NBL would ultimately be bought out by the team that later became the Toledo Jeeps instead. Interestingly, some early history involving them had misconstrued the franchise as continuing on as the Youngstown Bears in Youngstown, Ohio when they had actually only bought the players off of the Raiders franchise onto the Bears franchise that the city of Youngstown had created for the NBL.