National Basketball Association

Knicks, Rangers to raise ticket prices

Published Mar. 5, 2012 12:00 a.m. ET

foxsports

It's the price of Linning.

The resurgent New York Knicks and conference-leading New York Rangers both will boost their ticket prices for next season, making cheap seats not so cheap by this fall.

Knicks fans will pay an average of 4.9 percent more for their 2012-13 season tickets, while Blueshirts supporters will have to pony up about 9.5 percent more when the puck drops in October.

The Madison Square Garden Company did not immediately release any seating charts, but said "price increases are primarily focused on the upper bowl seats."

Seats in the nosebleed 400 level now go for between $10 and $45 per game for Knicks season subscribers.

Upper-deck ducats go for $39 across the board for Rangers season-ticket holders.

Officials justified the cheap-seat hike based on the massive overhaul the Garden is undergoing in three phases. The first phase, which was finished in the fall, did not reach the upper levels of the Garden. The second phase is scheduled to take place after the Knicks and Rangers seasons are over and will include the renovation of the upper bowl.

It has been a remarkable winter for New York sports fans, with the Knicks rising up from cellar-dwellers to contenders, thanks to the emergence of dynamic point guard Jeremy Lin.

The Rangers have, almost quietly, skated to a commanding lead in the Eastern Conference, with high-scoring right winger Marian Gaborik and stingy goal tender Henrik Lundqvist leading the charge.