SAN JOSE – The smallest announced crowd of the season took in Tuesday’s game between the San Jose Sharks and Dallas Stars at SAP Center.
The Sharks announced that just 10,070 tickets had been distributed for the game, as San Jose faced Joe Pavelski and Dallas for the second time in four days. The previous season-low was 10,074 for a Nov. 7 game against the Philadelphia Flyers.
The actual number of fans in attendance Tuesday looked to be far less than 10,000, with most sections around the arena far less than half full. Arena officials were expecting just over 6,000 fans in the building.
The smallest all-time crowd for a Sharks game at the downtown arena — that hasn’t been affected by capacity restrictions — is 10,059, announced for a Nov. 3, 2021 game against the Buffalo Sabres.
Some tickets for Tuesday’s game on the Sharks’ app about an hour were going for between $11-$15 before taxes and fees.
The seating capacity at SAP Center after renovations last offseason is 17,435, down from 17,562 in previous years. and there have been nine announced sellouts this season.
The Sharks average attendance this season – before Tuesday – was 13,758, or 78.9 percent of capacity, which ranks last among all 32 NHL teams.
Along with the announced sellouts, Tuesday’s game marked the 11th time in 30 home games that the Sharks have announced a crowd of less than 11,000.
The Sharks are 9-18-2 at home this season, and 15-39-6 overall as they came into Tuesday in 31st place in the NHL’s overall standings.
This season, the Sharks, coming off a 29th-place finish in the NHL standings and an offseason in which they traded Erik Karlsson, the Sharks only sold about 8,200 full-season equivalent ticket packages.
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