as the expansion team. In the process he became the Seals' new owner and prospective governor for the team's entry into the NHL. By then, Poile had turned over the coaching reins to player-coach Charlie Burns; the Seals reached the 1966 WHL playoffs and were one game away from their third finals appearance, but lost the last two games of their first-round playoff series against the eventual WHL champion Victoria Maple Leafs, which prevailed 4 games to 3. Following the playoff defeat, van Gerbig began preparing the Seals for their move to the NHL. He relocated the club from the Cow Palace to the brand-new Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum across the bay in Oakland for what was their final WHL season in 1966–67, changing their name to the California Seals. Former Chicago Black Hawks coach Rudy Pilous took over as coach, alternating duties with Burns, as the Seals recorded only their second winning record (32-30-10). The Seals' six-year run in the WHL ended when they were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs by Seattle; California's final WHL game was a 4-1 loss to the Totems on April 15, 1967, at the Seattle Center Coliseum. Tom Thurlby, one of the first five players signed by the Seals on September 7, 1961, was the only Seal to remain with the team for all six of its seasons in the WHL. He would also play 20 games for the NHL Seals in 1967–68. When the club joined the NHL, Gerbig retained a portion of the club's WHL roster — Charlie Burns, George Swarbrick, Gerry Odrowski, Tom Thurlby and Ron Harris. The rest of the club was built through an expansion draft. After the WHL As the organization left behind its WHL history and started anew as an NHL expansion franchise, the team retained the "California Seals" name in an effort to appeal to fans in both San Francisco and Oakland. However, after only a few months, the team had failed to attract many fans from San Francisco, and the name was changed to the Oakland Seals. When Oakland A's owner Charlie Finley bought the Seals in 1970, he renamed them the California Golden Seals; Finley would quickly lose patience with the struggling franchise and ended up selling the team back to the NHL. The ongoing struggles of the Seals in the NHL had them the subject of relocation talks multiple times, with