Tickets have officially sold out for the upcoming Big Ten women’s basketball tournament at Target Center.

The Big Ten Conference announced Friday that this is the first time the women’s basketball tournament has sold out in its 29-year history.

It’s not just a big deal for the Big Ten – it’s also a big deal for downtown Minneapolis.

The Big Ten anticipates more than 109,000 fans of collegiate women’s basketball during the games happening March 6-10 at Target Center. In total, there are 13 games across seven sessions, so that works out to almost 16,000 fans in the stands per session. Target Center's capacity is 20,000.

That means tens of thousands of people will travel to downtown Minneapolis to watch these games. While they’re in town, they’ll stay at hotels, eat at restaurants, drink at bars, and spend their money elsewhere, giving a nice boost to the local economy.

Meet Minneapolis told Downtown Voices that hotels across the city are filling up fast, thanks to the Big Ten and other large-scale events, like the American Physical Society's meeting from March 3-8 at the Minneapolis Convention Center. The closest hotel to Target Center, the Loews Minneapolis Hotel, already sold out for the weekend of the women's tournament, WCCO reported.

Tom's Watch Bar plans to play the women's tournament on every screen, expand hours and hire more staff to keep up with the expected influx of customers. An operating partner told WCCO that the sports bar's reservations are quickly being claimed and there's at least one private party booked for every day of the tournament.

Earlier this week, there were reports of the Big Ten women's basketball tournament's imminent sellout, and many sports fans credited the hype surrounding Iowa's star player.

Iowa senior Caitlin Clark is one of the most decorated and popular players in college basketball history. She was named "most outstanding player" in the last two Big Ten women's championships, both of which Iowa won.

Clark recently netted a career-high 49 points in one game and became the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer in women’s college basketball history with 3,569 career points. There's a chance she could break the NCAA all-time scoring record of both men and women during the Big Ten tournament.

Most of Iowa's games on the road have sold out this season, including the upcoming Gophers vs. Hawkeyes women’s basketball game next Wednesday, Feb. 28 at Williams Arena. It's colloquially known as "the Caitlin Clark effect."

Last year, the Big Ten women’s basketball tournament was held at Target Center for the first time, with nearly 48,000 fans in attendance, the league's previous attendance record for the event.

Meanwhile, the Big Ten men’s basketball tournament will be held March 13-17 at Target Center, and it could also sell out, as other men's events have in the past.

Approximately 8,000 tickets still remain for the men's games across all sessions, and organizers expect sales to pick up as it draws nearer, according to Meet Minneapolis.

This is downtown Minneapolis’ first time hosting the Big Ten men’s basketball tournament in its 27-year history.