NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) – Foxwoods Resort Casino will dramatically increase the size of what is already one of the nation’s largest poker rooms this month, an expansion that comes even as industry experts say the poker market is slowing.

By expanding New England’s only poker room from 76 to 114 tables, Foxwoods will enable more than 1,100 poker enthusiasts to play at once. But it also allocates more space for a game that, on average, brings in considerably less money than slot machines and other table games.

Poker has been hot in recent years, driven by televised tournaments and online gaming sites, and casinos have rushed to capitalize. There are nearly twice as many poker tables in Nevada today than there were three years ago, according to state gaming reports.

But some indications suggest the fad is cooling.

Analysts note that the ratings for televised poker are down, as are retail sales of poker items. And the average Nevada poker table brought in less money in 2005 than it did in 2004, the first per-table decline in years, gaming reports show.

“There will be some growth, but it will be at a slower pace going forward,” said Traci Mangini, a gaming industry analyst for ThinkEquity Partners in San Francisco.

Foxwoods says it isn’t worried. Even on weekdays, there’s often a wait before players can get into a poker game and Kathy Raymond, the casino’s director of poker operations, sees growth potential.

“There’s a whole generation out there that can’t get into the casinos, the college kids, that are waiting in the wings,” Raymond said. “It’s going to go on at least another three years, maybe another five, before it levels off. It’s not like the hula hoop craze.”

Even analysts who don’t think poker has another five years of growth left say it makes sense for Foxwoods to expand. Unlike manufacturing companies that build assembly lines years in advance, casinos can adapt quickly to changing trends.

“You put poker tables in, then you take them out and put slot machines in if the fad disappears,” said Bill Thompson, a professor with the Gaming Research Center at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. “So they’ll ride it and they’ll ride it for a profit.”

Casinos make money off poker by taking a small percentage of each pot. With just a handful of slot machines, a casino can match a poker table’s earnings without paying a dealer or a support staff.

Mohegan Sun, just a few miles from Foxwoods, closed its poker room more than two years ago and filled it with slots. Its slot revenue regularly exceeds Foxwoods and officials there have expressed no regrets.

Other casinos increasingly use poker to create buzz and build brand loyalty. Foxwoods is partnering with the World Poker Tour to sponsor the new poker room, which opens March 18, and is promoting it with a kickoff game on March 23 featuring actress Carmen Electra and a later high-stakes Texas Hold Em tournament with a televised final table.

Paul Girvan, director of the Innovation Group, a Louisiana consulting firm, said he has long believed the poker fad was overblown. But he said that doesn’t make it bad business.

“The level of interest in poker is much higher than it was five or six years ago and I think it’s brought a whole new younger market to casinos,” he said. “It’s not about what poker brings in, per se. It’s about getting that bigger demographic.”

Eugene M. Christiansen, chairman of the New York gaming consultant group Christiansen Capital Advisors, said it’s hard to bet against the Foxwoods expansion.

“We might have seen the top for poker, but it’s still big,” he said. “The global base is just enormous and it’s going to be around a long time.”