The Hawks plan to increase the number of fans in State Farm Arena for the second half of the season, starting with Saturday’s game against the Sacramento Kings.
Hawks CEO Steve Koonin said the team will expand the socially distanced seating capacity to 3,000 fans per game by opening the upper deck, an increase from an average attendance of about 1,300 since the team began allowing limited fans in late January.
The newly released tickets are for sale on a single-game basis, the first time this season the Hawks have sold tickets to the general public, Koonin said. All tickets in the first half of the season went to season ticket holders, he said.
Even at 3,000 fans, the Hawks will remain at less than 20% of the arena’s full capacity.
“That is where we’re comfortable,” Koonin said.
The increase comes as the Hawks have become more confident about their precautions and processes amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We have become very good at managing the social distancing and the mask wearing,” Koonin said, “and after now doing 17 home games (the first seven without fans) we have great processes and procedures. … So we’re going to go to 3,000 people, which will probably be the max that we go to this season — we’ll see where the season goes — because we’ve blocked a big part of our building off with signage behind the players’ side.
“In essence, it just opens the upper deck,” Koonin said of the increase. “We haven’t been putting anybody upstairs. We’re not changing the social distancing; that’s not even a discussion. We’re just opening more parts of the building. We literally opened just one (lower-level) side of the building (previously).”
The Hawks have 19 regular-season home games remaining.
The most fans they allowed in State Farm Arena for any game during the first half of the season was about 1,600, Koonin said.
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