2024 WNBA Phoenix All-Star Game ticket prices far cheaper than Women's Final Four
Tickets to the 2024 WNBA All-Star Game in Phoenix are selling for one-fifth the price of a ticket to the 2024 women's college basketball Final Four in Cleveland.
The All-Star Game, which is hosted by the Phoenix Mercury, now has a $412 average ticket price at resale, according to sellers TicketSmarter, SeatGeek and Vivid Seats. The league's midseason celebratory event runs from July 18-20.
That's compared to the average ticket sold to the women's national semifinals being $2,323, per Logitix.
One month before the Women's Final Four, the ticket prices were more than double the average sale price for the Men's Final Four ticket price of $1,001.21 for the semifinals, and $646.45 for the men's title game. That was largely from the star power of Indiana Fever rookie and former Iowa Hawkeyes star Caitlin Clark, who led Iowa to its second straight championship appearance before losing to undefeated South Carolina.
The Women's Final Four games' higher pricing was partially because of ticket supply and demand for the men's games and seating capacity at Glendale's State Farm Stadium. That venue is three times larger than the 19,432-seat capacity at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse in Cleveland.
The Footprint Center's 17,071 is a fraction less to Cleveland's capacity.
All other things equal, it's cheaper to see the WNBA All-Stars match up against the U.S. women's national team, which will compete in this summer's Paris Olympics.
The national team has Brittney Griner and the league's all-time scorer Diana Taurasi, both from the Mercury, and college basketball's all-time scoring leader Clark.
The advance tickets went on sale to the public January 30, and the WNBA Experiences' two-day ticket packages are already sold out. The various packages have exclusive access perks such meeting and getting a photo with the players, attending the pregame shootaround and reception, and watching the All-Star practice.
The WNBA's popularity continues its ascension putting up the league's biggest TV ratings in over 20 years. That includes Phoenix's road loss to the Las Vegas Aces and Fever's loss at the Connecticut Sun in those team's season openers, which aired Tuesday on ESPN.
Similar to Clark's hype entering the league, that Mercury-Sun game in 2004 was Taurasi's second game as a pro. Taurasi was the No. 1 overall pick by Phoenix that year after she led UConn to its third straight national title.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Phoenix Mercury hosting cheaper WNBA All-Star Game than Final Four
