Golden Knights Try To Find Better Balance Between VGK and Visiting Team Fans at T-Mobile Arena in Season 2

By ALAN SNEL

LVSportsBiz.com

 

For Vegas Golden Knights President Kerry Bubolz, it’s all about finding the right balance of Golden Knights fans vs. the number of fans of visiting teams at T-Mobile Arena in 2018-19.

 

The Vegas Golden Knights will attempt to fine-tune the composition of home crowds during the regular season so that there’s the right mix of VGK fans and opposition team fans to create just the right atmosphere at the VGK’s big ice house on the Strip.

 

Last season, the Knights welcomed visiting team fans, but there were some VGK home games where fans for the Minnesota Wild, Pittsburgh Penguins, Philadelphia Flyers, Edmonton Oilers, Chicago Blackhawks and Detroit Red Wings visited the Golden Knights’ home ice and made their presence known in a big way. It’s an issue that faces sunbelt NHL cities from Tampa Bay to Phoenix.

 

But Bubolz told LVSportsBiz.com Monday after a Henderson Chamber of Commerce event at MacKenzie River pizzeria at the VGK training center that he expects a better balance of Knights fans and opposition fans so that the Knights can enjoy the home ice while also having the spicy presence of fans of visiting clubs in the building, too.

 

Bubolz expects less visiting fans to be in T-Mobile Arena games as a result of the fact that there are more than 14,000 full season ticket holders and a smaller pool of individual game tickets that will be able to be snapped up by visiting team fans.

 

But keep in mind that many VGK season ticket holders unload tickets on the secondary market, so opposition fans can buy tickets to Golden Knights games via the secondary market like so many did in the inaugural 2017-18 season.

 

Bubolz also said that the team plans to deploy the same two-tier “Knights Vow” ticket price strategy if the team makes the Stanley Cup playoffs in year two.

 

The Knights tried to keep the home crowd as partisan as possible during the playoffs by offering postseason tickets at a cheaper price to season ticket holders if they promised to not resell their tickets on the secondary market.

 

Knights fans appreciated home crowds in the playoffs that were dressed in the home team colors, but Knights’ secondary ticket market partner StubHub was not so happy and allededly owed the Golden Knights more than $1 million in post season ticket revenues, according to a Golden Knights lawsuit. That legal action is still ongoing, Bubolz said.

 

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The Knights Vow worked well in the first two rounds of the playoffs, as only a small number of Los Angeles Kings and San Jose Sharks fans attended Golden Knights home games at T-Mobile Arena.

 

The Golden Knights were criticized in the Finals’ Game 5 when so many Washington Capitals fans were seen in T-Mobile Arena where the Caps clinched the Stanley Cup. But Bubolz said they mostly were western U.S.-based Capitals fans from places such as Los Angeles and Phoenix.

 

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Bubolz had some interesting things to tell the Henderson Chamber members.

 

He said Golden Knights coach Gerard Gallant was a “Golden Misfit” just like the players after he was unceremoniously fired by the Florida Panthers. Bubolz said Gallant had this message for his players: “Nobody wanted you? Nobody wanted me.”

 

Bubolz said team owner Bill Foley is “still pissed off” about losing to the Capitals in the Stanley Cup Finals and wants a “dynasty” in Las Vegas, noting Foley is an intense businessman who wanted “low-ego people” on the ice and in the front office.

 

Bubolz also noted Foley had the idea of the game intro sword ceremony three or four years before the owner even hired Bubolz. The sword ceremony involved an actor on skates for the opposition team trying to steal the Golden Knights sword, only to be defeated by a VGK character actor.

 

 

D.J. Allen, a Henderson Chamber longtime member who teaches businesses to use sports strategies to grow their operations, did a nice job interviewing Bubolz for the chamber crowd.

 

 

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