On one of the hottest days of summer, hockey is seeing sizzling ticket sales now that Zach Parise and Ryan Suter will be joining the Minnesota Wild roster.
Parise will now play as No. 11 after signing from the New Jersey Devils, and defenseman Ryan Suter will be swapping his Nashville Predators garb for a Wild jersey as well -- and the fresh faces are driving fans wild.
"I was flying in from Miami. I saw the trade on the news and I knew that jerseys were being made last night," said Chuck Strouth. "This was one of two locations -- so I came right from the airport to get a jersey."
The jerseys seemed to sell just as quickly as the could be made -- especially Parise's, but at the Wild ticket office, the 24 agents on the clock never stopped taking orders on Thursday.
"I came in around 11 a.m. yesterday, and I basically threw on a pair of shorts and my Wild polo and flew to work," recalled Matt Sayer. "By the time I logged on my phone at 11:30 until about 4:30-5 o'clock, it was non-stop."
In the past 24 hours alone, a total of 1,000 season ticket packages have been sold -- along with 120 custom Jerseys baring the name of Parise or Suter.
"This is the team now," said Strouth. "There's no other team out there anymore. Watch out, everybody. Here come the Wild."
