Personally, I'm not a huge fan of Las Vegas as a place to visit, I've been there, done that, too many times to find it enjoyable anymore, but I would definitely go out of my way to catch a few Flames games down there. I've always wanted to travel to catch some Flames games, and have always wanted to do a West coast Tour, and catch them in LA, San Jose and Anaheim, but financially, that's a pretty big trip.
Vegas is super cheap to get too, and stay in, and after the game, there's still things to do. Could make for some great bachelor parties, or birthday getaways.
Also, I think many are overlooking the local fan base. Their ECHL team over the past 5 years has pretty consistent season attendance, right around league average at 4354 people per game over those 5 years. Highest single year was this past season at 4581, lowest was in 2010-11 at 3940. I know, it doesn't sound like much, and certainly won't be enough to keep an NHL team afloat, but that's also for an ECHL product, I believe you'd draw a lot more casual local fans to NHL games on a regular basis than ECHL. and to put it in perspective, The Wranglers have a better turn out than more than half of all WHL teams over those same 5 years, and Adirondack has an average of 4082 fans show up, Abbotsford has an average of 3606 over that span as well. So more Vegas locals are showing up to watch far lower caliber hockey than a lot of cities with the best JR hockey, or semi pro hockey. Obviously Vegas has a far larger population, but again, I think you'll see that number climb substantially for an NHL game.
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