2026 World Junior Hockey Championship<\/a>, and attendance numbers show the Team USA fans are showing up in droves.<\/p>\nSo far, the U.S. has played three games and attendance numbers showed nearly 14,000 fans showed up for each game.<\/p>\n
That number is nearly four times higher than the average attendance at all the other international games so far this tournament.<\/p>\n
There appears to be a strong home ice advantage when you consider that fewer than 2,000 fans showed up for the average Team USA game during the first round of the World Junior Championship two years ago in Sweden.<\/p>\n
However, the attendance numbers for the other teams in the tournament appear to be lower than in previous years.<\/p>\n
Minnesota Sports and Events COO John Klinkenberg says it\u2019s unclear whether international relations between other countries, especially Canada, are having an adverse impact on ticket sales.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, the attendance is what we thought it would be,\u201d Klinkenberg said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith Canada, it seems to be building as Canada is continuing to perform well. The enthusiasm around that team is picking up,\u201d Klinkenberg said.<\/p>\n
According to attendance records from the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), the average Team Canada game so far has brought in an average of 4,683 fans per game.<\/p>\n
That number is lower than the average attendance at Team Sweden games, which is 4,690 fans per game. Compared to previous World Junior Championships, the Canadian attendance so far has been relatively low.<\/p>\n
IIHF records show an average of 18,004 fans per game showed up for the first three Team Canada games during the World Junior Championship in 2025. This number was likely inflated by the fact that the tournament was held in Ottawa, Canada.<\/p>\n
A more accurate comparison may be the 2024 World Junior Championship, which was held in Sweden<\/p>\n
During the first three Team Canada games of the tournament that year, an average of 8,749 fans showed up to each game.<\/p>\n
However, it\u2019s difficult to draw comparisons between different tournaments because there are countless other factors that must be considered, including team matchups, arena capacity, and weather, just to name a few.<\/p>\n
Overall, ticket sales through Monday show 85,524 hockey fans have attended the 2026 World Junior Championship so far, compared to 138,588 fans during this same time period last year and 72,796 fans the year prior.<\/p>\n
Jaimee Lucke Hendrikson with Visit Saint Paul says hotel and restaurant owners are reporting a strong surge in business, and they are happy with the turnout so far.<\/p>\n
\u201cHotel occupancy numbers this time of year can dip into 20% to 30% on some nights. This event came at a great time of the year for them. In terms of restaurant activity it\u2019s very similar to when there is a home Wild game. There\u2019s a lot of energy and its\u2019 fun to see,\u201d Hendrikson said.<\/p>\n
Klinkenberg agrees that many hockey fans are choosing to spend a significant amount of time in downtown St. Paul between the hockey games.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur fan fest, our Bold North Breakaway, has been averaging an attendance of 3,000 to 4,000 people per day, which is outstanding,\u201d Klinkenberg said.<\/p>\n
Tournament organizers are expecting to see a sold-out crowd on New Year\u2019s Eve during the Team USA and Team Sweden game.<\/p>\n
Organizers are also expecting to see a significant increase in ticket sales during the next few rounds of the tournament.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s just going to continue to build,\u201d Klinkenberg said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Through the first few days of the tournament, attendance at Team USA games is outpacing all other games…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":663611,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[49,978,659],"class_list":{"0":"post-663610","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-united-states","9":"tag-us","10":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115811454963444845","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=663610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/663611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=663610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=663610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=663610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}