Milwaukee’s Fiserv Forum will host another Blackhawks preseason game in 2024.
Ben Pope/Sun-Times
The Blackhawks are headed back to Milwaukee.
The team will host a preseason game this coming season against the Blues on Oct. 5 at Fiserv Forum, a source told the Sun-Times on Monday.
The exhibition contest comes two years after the Hawks first visited the Milwaukee Bucks’ home arena for a preseason game against the Wild in October 2022.
That 2022 event — the NHL’s first foray into Wisconsin since 1993 — was a big success, shining a spotlight on the state’s passionate yet underrated hockey community. The roughly 15,000 available tickets sold out in less than an hour, and 81% of tickets were purchased by Wisconsin residents rather than Hawks fans traveling up from Illinois.
A few players politely mentioned after that game that the ice conditions were subpar at Fiserv Forum, which isn’t designed for hockey. That issue should be addressed and improved this time around.
Less than three months after the preseason contest, meanwhile, the Hawks will again host the Blues in an unconventional location — Wrigley Field — in the Winter Classic on Dec. 31. The rest of the NHL’s 2024-25 pre- and regular-season schedule will be announced later this summer.