Golden Knights Striving to Reach Bar Set High from Cinderella Inaugural Season, But Are Cracks Beginning to Show in VGK Armor?
By ALAN SNEL
LVSportsBiz.com
The text to Golden Knights fans who signed up for the standing room only ticket alerts offered quite the deal Monday.
“A limited quantity of Flight Deck West Standing Room only for $49 and Limited View Upper SROs for $39 are available!” The ticket alert was sent out to entice fans to buy SROs for Tuesday’s Golden Knights-Dallas Stars game at T-Mobile Arena.
Those are juicy low ticket prices — even if they’re SRO tickets — when you consider Golden Knights tickets are going for a couple hundred dollars on the secondary ticket market and some VGK season ticket holders were lamenting about their season ticket prices going up.
The sub-$40 SRO ticket prices might just be the first sign that the Golden Knights are slipping ever so slightly from a lofty perch that has given Las Vegas fans unrealistic expectations for season two after the Year 1 miracle team journeyed to the Stanley Cup Finals in their inaugural year of existence.
The Golden Knights have lost seven of their last eight home games and actually heard a few boos in the first period of a 6-3 loss to the Winnipeg Jets Friday night when the Knights players performed miserably during a one-man advantage during a power play.
Cheaper SRO tickets and boos. Wow, who would have thunk it? But don’t feel too badly for the Golden Knights quite yet. After 31 home games in Year 2, the Knights are averaging 18,299 fans a game in a building that officially sits 17,367 for hockey. That’s filling the venue to 105.4 percent of capacity, good for a tied-for-second (with Minnesota) out of 31 NHL teams in percentage of capacity, trailing only Chicago (106.8 percent). Merchandise and sponsorship sales are strong, with the VGK still having leverage to ask for premium corporate sponsor deals.
And in a blockbuster trade announced Monday, VGK General Manager McPhee was pleased with the “get” of Ottawa’s Mark Stone, a talented 26-year-old forward known for his all-around skill set and solid character off the ice. A veteran of 366 NHL games, all with the Senators, Stone has 123 goals and 188 assists for 311 points. And this season, Stone has a career-high 28 goals and 34 assists for 62 points in 59 games. To get Stone, the Golden Knights traded forward Oscar Lindberg, heralded defenseman prospect Erik Brannstrom and a 2020 second round draft pick (originally belonging to Dallas).
You can see McPhee’s media session on the trade here.
McPhee said the team’s dismal recent play did not influence his decision to acquire Stone by the trade deadline. Even with its recent slide, Vegas is in third place in the Pacific Division, which is a playoff position. It’s doubtful the VGK will catch either Calgary or San Jose based on its recent play. So, the Knights are trying to hold off the Arizona Coyotes, just six points behind the VGK’s 69 points with a game at hand.
Even before the Golden Knights held a press conference on the Stone trade, his jersey was already being sold at the team store at the Golden Knights training center in Summerlin.
LVSportsBiz.com will be back at T-Mobile Arena Tuesday when the Knights host the Dallas Stars for a 7 p.m. game. Look for us on Facebook Live at 5:45 p.m.
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