The Pacers and Hawks will face off in Game 2 tonight at Bankers Life Fieldhouse in a must-win situation for the favored Pacers — who were upset in Game 1, 101-93. The Pacers have had a hard time drawing fans to games since the Malice at the Palace back in late 2004. They were a playoff team in 2012, but were next-to-last in attendance that year. Their gate receipts have gotten better this season, but for Game 2, you can still purchase a ticket at StubHub.com for under $10.
By way of reddit’s wonderful r/NBA community, comes word that tickets were going for as low as $9.00. After checking StubHub.com for tonight’s game, it seems they’ve increased to… $9.99 for the balcony-level seats.
The Pacers had the best record in the East this season, but even so, they were middle of the road in terms of ticket sales: drawing an average of 17,500 fans per game, which was the 15th-highest in the NBA.
Last season, when they finished with the Conference’s second-best record, they were just 25th in the league in average attendance, and in the 2011-12 season, when they made the playoffs, they were next-to-last in average attendance. Indiana just hasn’t supported their professional team after the 2004-05 title-contending team with then Ron Artest and Stephen Jackson, went into the stands in Detroit.
Now, with the team faltering at the most important time of the season, fans are again hard to come by…for the biggest game so far this year.
(reddit)
Why don’t more fans go to Pacers games in Indianapolis?
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