Las Vegas Market Has Room For Both Pricey Golden Knights Experience and Affordable DTLV Lights Soccer

By ALAN SNEL

LVSportsBiz.com

 

Joaquin Aztorga is both a Vegas Golden Knights and Las Vegas Lights FC season ticket holder.

 

He enjoys both sports.

 

But Aztorga, a member of the Luz Y Fuerza (Light and Strength) supporter group, loves bringing in his drums and drum sticks (no instruments allowed at Golden Knights games) and he loves the outdoors (even with Saturday night’s frosty weather conditions.)

 

“For Latinos, soccer is like religion,” said Azrorga, a city of Las Vegas parks department employee. “It’s our job to bring excitement and atmosphere. The coach, Chelis, wants to bring a show to the field and our job is to bring a show to the crowd.” (Indeed, the majority of a Lights crowd are Latinos, while the Golden Knights’ crowd is mostly white.)

 

Interestingly enough, the Golden Knights’ high-powered in-game entertainment experience actually includes drums, too — the LED drummers called Drumbots who march from the Strip at New York-New York into T-Mobile Arena, and then around the venue until they arrive at their perch at the fortress.

 

Aztorga’s drummer crew is not so high-tech and they don’t wear color-coordinated costumes with super-hero-looking sunglasses like the Drumbots.

 

The Lights’ entry into a growing Las Vegas sports market shows that there’s a niche for a National Hockey League property where the average ticket is $88 and attendance is inching toward 18,000 a game (more than 103 percent of capacity) at a $375 million, two-year-old, high-tech arena off the Strip and a United Soccer League club where the entry point ticket price is 15 bucks and crowds have ranged from 6,000 to 10,000 plus at aging Cashman Field in downtown Las Vegas.

 

You’re talking about two different settings. The Golden Knights have a chorus of local stars from Lil Jon and Imagine Dragons to Pawn Stars’ Rick Harrison and Carrot Top who enjoy hitting Golden Knights’ games.

 

The Lights don’t have quite the same star power, attracting Findlay Toyota GM John Barr (he kicked soccer balls into the Cashman Field crowd at the half tonight) not to mention Zappos’ two llamas (they appeared on the field during the pre-game ceremony Saturday night.)

 

While the Lights’ big sponsor is Zappos, the downtown-based online shoe/apparel retailer, the Golden Knights have corporate sponsors ranging from City National Bank and Ed Bernstein to the Cosmopolitan to Wynn Las Vegas. (Both the Laborers 872 union and Findlay Toyota sponsor both.

 

One thing the Golden Knights don’t have is smoke bombs, which are permitted at Lights matches. But a Lights fan with permission to use the smoke devices said the club advised him that the the smoke bombs can only be used when the teams walk out and when the Lights score a goal.

 

Indeed, a Lights penalty kick goal that made the score, 2-1, tonight triggered some yellow smoke in the supporter section, and again after the second goal. D.C. United ended up winning Saturday night, 4-2. The Lights lost to all three MLS teams Feb. 10, 17 and Saturday night during the preseason.

 

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And Lights fans can bring in homemade flags. Local 22-year math teacher Jack Whitefoot of the Electric Company supporter group fashioned a five-by-eight foot flag that he waved tonight.

 

It was cold out Saturday night, but owner Brett Lashbrook told LVSportsBiz.com before the game that more than 7,000 tickets were sold for Saturday’s match between the Lights and MLS D.C. United. Attendance was announced at 7,158. Not too shabby considering the cold conditions.

 

The team also tried a special technique to neutralize any fans who chanted, “puto,” which is perceived by some as an anti-gay slur, when the opposition goaltender kicked the ball during a goal kick. The Lights tried to play music over the Cashman PA system to drown out any “puto” chants. But in the second half, the “puto” chant could still be detected. LVSportsBiz.com reported on the puto chant issue after the first game Feb. 10.

 

“We all are against it,” team owner Lashbrook said. Lashbrook said the club doesn’t like the word and will continue working on ways to address the issue.

 

Lights player Miguel Garduno also responded to the puto chant after the game in this video.

 

 

There won’t be Lights soccer in downtown Las Vegas for a month. The first-year club opens its USL schedule on the road in Fresno March 17 before making its regular season home debut March 24.

 

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