Last year, the NBA averaged 17,319 fans at their games. The NHL, on the other hand, averaged 17,126.
Most people may be surprised that the NHL is this close to the NBA in terms of attendance. However, when one looks at the numbers deeper it becomes clear that the NHL actually has the advantage.
First of all, the Winter Classic—which had 68,111 fans in attendance at Heinz Field to watch the Penguins and Capitals play—is not included in this figure. That boosts the average by about 50 people.
It must also be recognized that when arenas are configured for basketball, they seat more people because NBA courts are smaller than hockey rinks. This allows for more seats during basketball games.
At the United Center in Chicago, there are 1,199 more seats available for Bulls games. The Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia offers 907 more seats for Sixers games than Flyers games. There are several instances where this situation occurs: Boston, Los Angeles, Denver, Toronto, Washington, Dallas and New York are cities that have an NHL and NBA team that share arenas.
This is one-third of the league. Most of those cities mentioned above like Washington, Toronto, Los Angeles, Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Chicago sell out their hockey games regularly. This means they probably would be able to sell out 700-1,000 more tickets if the arenas had a balanced seating capacity.
All of a sudden, the attendance becomes more balanced.
Finally, the excuse that NHL tickets are cheaper than NBA tickets is a myth. The average price to attend an NHL game in 2011 is $57.10.On the other hand, the average price for an NBA game is only $48.
People are paying more money to go see hockey games. One would expect that since NHL tickets are 19 percent more expensive than NBA tickets, less people will be attending hockey games. As seen from the above argument, that is not the case.
The NHL is also thriving this year in terms of attendance; 20 of the 30 teams are playing above 96 percent capacity, and this includes markets like Nashville and Tampa Bay. Fourteen of the 30 teams have sold out every game thus far.
The NBA, on the contrary, only had six teams sell out every game last season.
