GLENDALE, Ariz. – With the 2011-12 regular season concluding this past weekend, the CHL announced yesterday that the average attendance for this past season was the highest since the 2006-07 campaign. 
During the 2011-12 season, the 20th Anniversary for the CHL, the league drew 1,867,801 fans averaging 4,042 per game. The league’s average attendance reflects a 6.5% increase from the 2010-11 season. “We want to thank all of the CHL fans for their support during the season, and are pleased that many patrons got to watch CHL players in action, and enjoy the atmosphere in the arenas,” CHL Commissioner Duane Lewis said. ”We are excited to begin our playoffs this week, and know that fans will continue to show their support for their clubs as they fight for the Ray Miron Presidents’ Cup.” CHL teams celebrated 38 sellouts during this past season with the Missouri Mavericks leading the way with 19 sellouts in their 33 home games. Three teams (the Wichita Thunder, Fort Wayne Komets and Tulsa Oilers) saw crowds of more than 10,000 fans with the Thunder seeing the largest crowd of the season back on February 11th (13,168), one of three 10,000+ crowds for Wichita. Fort Wayne had three crowds of 10,000+ fans and the Tulsa Oilers welcomed 10,035 fans on January 14th. On the season, 40 crowds of more than 7,000 were at CHL arenas with the Fort Wayne Komets drawing 22 crowds of 7,000+ and leading the league in average attendance with 7,770 followed by Wichita’s average of 6,249 and Missouri’s average of 5,531. The Evansville IceMen’s first season in the new Ford Center saw them finish fourth in the league with 4,882 fans per game with four crowds of more than 8,000 fans. Rapid City rounds out the top five with an average crowd of 4,700. The league’s final weekend (March 23-25th) saw close to 100,000 fans (99,054) see the end of the campaign unfold with an average of 5,503 for the 18 games played over Friday, Saturday and Sunday. A dozen of the 18 games had crowds of 5,000+ with two games seeing more than 8,000 fans. Contact comments@prohockeynews.com
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