By ALAN SNEL
LVSportsBiz.com
The Vegas Golden Knights have played some memorable games at home — the emotionally-charged season-opener; the win over the Tampa Bay Lightning with two seconds left; and William Karlsson’s tricky, between-the-legs shot that defeated San Jose to clinch the division.
Guess what? Now come the playoffs — and the level of hockey will now go up even another notch, said Golden Knights star forward Jonathan Marchessault, who was at his locker following Monday’s 11 a.m. practice.
“You will see high quality hockey and high pace hockey,” Marchessault said. “You will see bruises and more sweating.”
The Golden Knights got a taste of playoff intensity hockey with tough wins in their final two home games against the St. Louis Blues and San Jose Sharks at T-Mobile Arena.
Hard to believe the greatest show on ice in Las Vegas could be more entertaining. But you know the team’s in-game entertainment chief, Jonny Greco, will also be upping his game to infuse the first round playoff matches with regional rival Los Angeles Kings with more pizzazz and memorable touches.
Coach Gerard Gallant has previously said the home ice advantage at T-Mobile Arena has been literally deafening.
“I can’t wait to see it on Wednesday night,” Gallant told reporters of the arena atmosphere for Game 1.
LVSportsBiz.com held an informal poll on Twitter to see who would be the crowd favorite to sing the national anthem before Game 1 Wednesday. The poll winner was Carnell “Golden Pipes” Johnson.
It’s a foregone conclusion that the Golden Knights’ game attendance will easily bypass T-Mobile Arena’s stated capacity of 17,367, so expect a packed house in the 18,500 range when the LAK and VGK face off Wednesday. The Knights averaged 18,042 fans a game — or 103.9 percent of capacity.
The Golden Knights management tried an innovative technique to motivate season ticket holders to not sell their playoff tickets on the secondary market by allowing Knights season ticket holders to buy their postseason tickets at a cheaper price if they “vowed” to not resell the tickets.
The cheapest ticket on StubHub for Kings-Knights game 1 is $180 — nearly $100 more than the average regular-season ticket cost of $88. Lots of upper bowl seats were running in the lower $200s per ticket range.
The Golden Knights stand to generate about $3 million per home playoff game in total ticket revenues based on a crowd of 18,500 buying an average ticket at $165 per seat.
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Fan Ben Gries, an executive chef in downtown Las Vegas, said he’s on the fence about buying a ticket for Game 1 because of its high cost.
But his girlfriend, Bernie Rodriquez, said she hopes the Golden Knights keep on advancing playoff round to playoff round because she can’t imagine life without Knights hockey.
“I don’t know what we’ll do when the season is over,” she said. “We’re gonna cry.”
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