MANILA, Philippines – With Gilas Pilipinas looming large to get the top spot in Group E heading into the knockout stages that will begin on Friday, tickets to the FIBA Asia games are expected to sell briskly starting on Thursday.
The SM Mall of Asia Arena announced on Wednesday that tickets to the quarterfinals all the way to the finals on Sunday will start selling on Thursday at 10 a.m. on smtickets.com and all SM ticket outlets.
Gilas Pilipinas will be playing at 8:30 pm on Friday against Kazakhstan if it hurdles Hong Kong on Wednesday evening.
Tickets to the morning games, which starts at 10:30 a.m., are pegged at P500 (Patron A), P300 (Patron B), P250 (Lower A) and 200 (Lower B).
The 10:30 a.m. and 12:45 p.m. schedules will feature the matches for the 9th to 12th place while the 3:00 p.m. will have the first quarterfinal pairing, which is not yet determined as of posting time.
There will be three evening matches which will start at 5:45 p.m. that include the Gilas’ quarterfinal game.
The evening tickets are priced differently starting at P150 (Gen Ad), P300 (Upper), P1,000 (Lower B), P1,500 (Lower A), P2,000 (Patron B), P2,300 (Patron A) and P3,800 (VIP).
SM tickets will only sell two tickets per person and will not entertain ticket reservations. But a person can purchase another two tickets on top of the two tickets allowed only by falling in line again.
Ticket prices for the morning games on Saturday will remain the same but the evening games which will feature the semifinal matches will be much higher.
The semifinal tickets are pegged at P150 (Gen Ad), P300 (Upper), P1,500 (Lower B), P2,000 (Lower A), P2,500 (Patron B), P2,800 (Patron A) and P4,800 (VIP).
Tickets to the finals and bronze medal match on Sunday will be sold at P150 (Gen Ad), P350 (Upper), P2,000 (Lower B), P2,500 (Lower A), P3,000 (Patron B), P3,300 (Patron A) and P5,300 (VIP).
Scalpers have made a killing with many of them openly selling tickets in front of the MOA Arena.
Philstar.com has learned that Upperbox tickets to last night’s game against Qatar were sold at P500 from its original price of only P175 while the Lower Box tickets originally priced at P500 went for as much as P1,500.