SAN ANTONIO — The San Antonio Spurs are set to break the NBA’s single-game attendance record on Friday night when they host the Golden State Warriors.
The Spurs announced Wednesday they have sold 63,592 tickets for the game, which will be played at the Alamodome — their former home in San Antonio. It’s possible that, with standing room tickets, the Spurs could host about 68,000 people.
Either way, they’re assured of breaking a record that stood for nearly 25 years. The biggest crowd at an NBA regular-season game — measured by tickets distributed — is the 62,046 people who gathered to watch Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls meet the Atlanta Hawks at the Georgia Dome on March 27, 1998.
The biggest crowd in league history was 108,713 for the 2010 All-Star Game at the home of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys.
Excluding that All-Star Game, Friday’s matchup will be only the fourth NBA game with an attendance exceeding 50,000.
Two of those were at the Silverdome in Pontiac, Michigan — the Detroit Pistons drew 52,745 for a game against Philadelphia on Feb. 14, 1987, then had a crowd of 61,983 for a game against Boston on Jan. 29, 1988. That record stood until the game at the Georgia Dome in 1998.
The Alamodome record for an NBA game is 39,554 on June 18, 1999, when New York visited San Antonio for Game 2 of that year’s NBA Finals.
The Spurs announced the record in the franchise’s typical understated fashion: A press release was distributed, saying only “63,592.” They played in the Alamodome from 1993 through 2002, before moving into their current arena.