NHL sets attendance record

CHICAGO (Reuters) - The National Hockey League, aided by tight races among several teams jockeying for playoffs spots, on Monday said fan attendance for the 2007-2008 regular season rose 1.8 percent to a record high for the third consecutive year.
Total attendance at more than 21.24 million resulted in a per-game average of 17,265 people per game, the NHL said in a statement. That was the first time the league topped 17,000 per game in a season.
Analysts have said in the past that the NHL, with much smaller national television contracts than other U.S. pro sports leagues, relies more heavily on fan attendance.
NHL teams played to 93.6 percent of capacity over the 1,230 games, outdoing the 2006-2007 season figures of 20.86 million and 16,961 per-game, or 91.7 percent of capacity, the NHL said. In 2005-2006, the respective figures were 20.85 million and 16,955 per game. NHL games have attracted 20 million or more fans in each of the past seven seasons.
In the just-completed regular season, the NHL's six Canadian teams once again sold every possible ticket, including the Montreal Canadiens team that led the league with a per-game average of 21,273.
Some analysts and observers of the sport have speculated that some of the teams in the southern part of the United States should be folded or relocated to Canada, where hockey is a more popular sport.
For the purposes of calculation, the Buffalo Sabres were credited with a normal regular-season sellout (18,690) for the Winter Classic against the Pittsburgh Penguins on New Year's Day at Ralph Wilson Stadium in Buffalo. If the actual attendance of 71,217 for the outdoor game is included, the aggregate NHL attendance increases to 21.29 million, or 17,302 per game.
(Reporting by Ben Klayman, editing by Mark Porter)