Hunting for last-minute Super Bowl tickets? Now may be a good time to strike

It's crunchtime for deal hunters looking to score last-minute tickets to Sunday's big game.

The good news? Prices had dropped somewhat on online marketplaces Friday, with the cheapest seats on StubHub dipping to about $3,100 Friday morning, down hundreds of dollars from earlier this week.

But ticket experts say prices may not fall as dramatically as buyers have come to expect the closer it gets to kickoff.

"Sellers have become more sophisticated, and they know that people wait," said StubHub spokesperson Cameron Papp. "I don't expect it drop too much anymore heading into the game."

Slightly higher demand is partly staving off the kind of last-minute price drops fans look for, and there is not as much supply in the market as in years past, said Jesse Lawrence, founder of TicketIQ, which tracks ticket market data.

Earlier ticket sales have also been a driving force, Lawrence said, along with the NFL taking a more active role managing the market after the notorious Super Bowl ticket debacle of 2015 left many fans ticketless.

"Prices came out of the gate higher and they stayed in that range," Lawrence said. "It's more stable, predictable and secure but also more expensive."

The average asking price for a seat at Sunday's game is $5,642 as of Friday, exceeding last year's average of $4,990 at this time, according to TicketIQ data.

At StubHub, sales are up 60 percent compared to two days before the game last year.

Philadelphia Eagles supporters are largely behind the robust appetite for seats at Sunday's game, Papp said. The team last competed in the Super Bowl in 2005, falling to the New England Patriots. Sunday's showdown in Minneapolis marks a hotly anticipated rematch.

But at this point, most out-of-town fans coming from Philadelphia or Boston have already booked their trips, Papp said. That means sports enthusiasts in the Twin Cities eager to nab a spot at the game will be behind the bulk of sales from now until kickoff.

And if the Vikings had made it?

"Prices probably would have been double," Lawrence said.

Hannah Covington • 612-673-4751