By TIM TUCKER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

All tickets have been sold for this month's NHL All-Star Game at Philips Arena, with most going to local fans.

Unlike marquee sporting events held here in recent years — the Super Bowl in 2000, the NBA All-Star Game in 2003 and college basketball's Final Four in 2007 — the NHL leaves most tickets for its all-star game in the hands of the host city.

The NHL took 6,500 tickets for the game for use by the league, its teams and business partners, according to Thrashers executive vice president Lou DePaoli. The remaining 12,000-plus tickets were sold by the Thrashers.

DePaoli said the team's season-ticket holders got first shot at the seats. Next, seats were offered to season-ticket holders of the Hawks, the Thrashers' corporate sibling. Then, remaining seats "were gobbled up," DePaoli said, by non-season-ticket holders who had put their names on a waiting list via the Thrashers' Web site.

The Thrashers said about 60 percent of the names on the waiting list were locals.

DePaoli, a former NBA marketing executive, contrasted the NHL All-Star Game with the NBA's:

"The NBA takes the vast majority of seats, while the NHL takes about a third," he said. "It's better for us, most definitely, to have [local fans] in the building.

"The bigger picture is the game creates a legacy for Atlanta and gets people talking about hockey."

The NHL All-Star Game, in Atlanta for the first time, will be played in Philips on Jan. 27, starting at 6 p.m. It will be preceded by a SuperSkills competition at 7 p.m. on Jan. 26.

Tickets for the All-Star Game and SuperSkills event were sold as a package. Prices ranged from $195 to $350.

Although the Thrashers were responsible for selling the seats not claimed by the NHL, the ticket revenue goes to the league. The team bears the expense of staffing and operating the arena for the all-star events and receives a percentage of sales of suites, concessions and merchandise.

"What we try to do at worst is come out of this at breakeven," DePaoli said. "We'll definitely hit breakeven."

He said 89 of the arena's 92 suites have been leased for all-star weekend and said he's optimistic about leasing the final three.

Tickets remain available for various ancillary events surrounding the all-stars' visit, including a morning session at Philips on Jan. 26 that will be part skate, part concert — NHL Rockin' Skate 2008. Tickets cost $10 to $30.

Not part of the All-Star schedule is one event proposed by Thrashers officials last year: an outdoor fan festival in Centennial Olympic Park. "That didn't work out for various reasons," DePaoli said, "primarily cost and [unpredictable] weather."