Sudbury Five pro basketball team to debut before sold out home crowd

Sudbury's professional basketball team is off to a good start on the court and at the box office.

The Sudbury Five won their first two National Basketball games on the road last weekend and Thursday night's home opener at the Sudbury Arena is sold out.

For basketball games, the ends of the arena are blocked off and there is seating at courtside, making for a total of 2,600 seats, down from 5,100 for hockey.

But team account executive Jennifer McGillivray says tickets have sold so well for the first game that some extra corner seats have been opened up and the Five are expecting to debut in front of a crowd of more than 3,000.

She says the target market for basketball is a bit younger than who might come to the arena for junior hockey.

"It's a different game for a different group of people, not that there aren't going to be tonnes and tonnes of Wolves fans and we certainly appreciate their support as well," she says.

"Of course most of the revenue comes from ticket sales, advertising sales and community support and sponsorship. And we've been overwhelmed by the support of the community."

McGillivray says the Five needs to bring in an average crowd of 1,500 over the 20 home games to break even this first season.

The average attendance for the league was 2,000 last year, but most of the 10 teams didn't draw those kinds of numbers and some played before just a few hundred fans.