Just to highlight some attendance discrepancies lets looks at the Calgary Hitmen. I've been to a bunch of regular season games even during the lockout where the attendance was in the 4000-8000 range.
Fan appreciation night? Probably 13,000-17,000 fans. When they make the playoffs? More around the 12,000+ range. If they win a round or two? Start looking for sellouts to potentially happen.
Can you conceive of 17,000+ fans watching a sold out WHL game involving 16-19 year old kids playing hockey at a level of hockey that is noticeably inferior to the NHL with extremely questionable refereeing? Fans will flock to a playoff success, especially if the NHL team is struggling. And you get a different market including families that could not afford to take their kids to every single NHL playoff game.
There are a lot of reasons why you shouldn't be extrapolating the attendance out at the start of the 1st season and assuming it will be similar for the entire first two years. The Heat's success, their playoff success, and the potential lack of Canucks success all have the potential to really cement a solid season ticket base or not.
|