Arizona Coyotes president and CEO Xavier A. Gutierrez told ESPN’s Greg Wyshynski on Wednesday he expects the team to sell out all of its home games at Mullett Arena on the Arizona State University campus.
The Coyotes previously played out of Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale, Arizona, from 2003 to 2022, with their tenure at the facility ending after the city of Glendale elected not to renew the team’s lease.
While the Coyotes attempt to close a deal with the city of Tempe, Arizona, this fall to build a new $1.7 billion entertainment district — including a privately funded 16,000-seat arena — they’ll spend at least the next three seasons as a temporary tenant at the Arizona State Sun Devils’ brand-new 5,000-seat ice hockey facility. Tempe City Council voted 5–2 earlier this year to begin formal negotiations with the Coyotes on their arena proposal.
“We know this is going to be sold-out for every single game, and we never had any doubt that was going to be the case,” Gutierrez told ESPN. “We could have sold this out to our existing season ticket base, but we didn’t think that was the right approach. We want to make sure that fans who have never experienced a game could experience it. That’s a very tricky thing when you’ve downsized capacity.”
Mullett Arena, which is still in the finishing stages of construction, will be both the NHL’s newest and smallest facility when the Coyotes play their first game there (against the Winnipeg Jets on October 28).
According to the ESPN report, the average price of Coyotes tickets has jumped from $90 in Glendale to $170 in Tempe. The Coyotes averaged 14,605 fans per game in 2019–20 — the final pre-pandemic season — good to rank 28th in the NHL, ahead of only the Florida Panthers, New York Islanders and Ottawa Senators.
Gutierrez told ESPN the Coyotes’ season-ticket revenue is up 50% from its highest point during their entire tenure in Glendale. The team has also sold out all 20 of its suites for the coming season.
The Coyotes also plan to have a 400-seat student section in Mullett Arena, with ticket prices expected to land in the ballpark of $25–$50 per game.
Gutierrez emphasized the Coyotes’ commitment to Tempe as their present and future home, pointing out how Mullett Arena is in a “much more centrally located area” compared to Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale.
The Coyotes aim to build their proposed 16,000-seat facility just over a mile east of ASU on the site of a compost yard, with environmental remediation planned before construction begins. Coyotes forwards Clayton Keller, Nick Schmaltz and Christian Fischer appeared before Tempe City Council in June to express their support for the new arena; representatives from nearby Sky Harbor International Airport have raised concerns about the close proximity between the airport and the proposed residential area within the entertainment district.
“We’re still very confident that we have the right deal, the right project and the right ownership group to get it done,” Gutierrez told ESPN. “It’s the first privately financed sports and entertainment district in the history of Arizona. [Playing at Mullett Arena] is the bridge to that.”
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