The San Antonio Spurs want to play in front of a friendly crowd when they take on the New York Knicks in Game 5 of the NBA Finals — and they’re taking a pretty extreme step to make sure of it: refusing to sell tickets to out-of-towners, including East Coast-based fans of the series-leading Knicks, who are just one game from victory.
Late Friday night (June 12), TMZ broke the news that the Ticketmaster page for Game 5 tickets has some very important information right at the top: tickets will be limited to people who live within 150 miles of San Antonio’s Frost Bank Center, where the game will take place on Saturday (June 13). Even if you already have tickets, they “will be canceled without notice and refunds given.”
See for yourself in the screenshot below.
Ticketmaster’s decision comes not long after The New York Post reported that about 45% of the tickets for the game have been bought by people from New York and New Jersey.
Game 5 is likely to be a pivotal one in the series. The Knicks, who are up 3-1 in the best-of seven showdown, have not been in the Finals since 1999, and have not won a title since 1973.
That situation has apparently led to a huge demand for tickets among Knicks die-hards eager to see their team win it all. Per the Post, people with New York billing zip codes have snatched up 37% of the seats, and people from neighboring New Jersey have grabbed an additional 8%. Meanwhile, at least as of early Thursday, only 12% of potential attendees were from Texas.
TMZ reached out to both the Spurs and the NBA for comment, but had not heard back as of this writing.
