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The Missouri Gaming Commission has decided to reject the NCAA’s call to block wagers tied to college athletes.
Regulators said the request, made following recent betting scandals, will not be enforced for now, though they left the door open to revisit the matter as the state’s recently launched sports betting market develops.
The NCAA had sent letters to gambling boards across the country urging them to outlaw college prop bets. These wagers focus on individual player performances, such as how many points a basketball player scores or the number of passes a player makes. The association also asked states to restrict other specialty bets, including those predicting halftime point spreads.
Missouri’s rejection came just a week after the NCAA’s appeal and confirms that college props will remain part of the state’s betting market for now.
Just too early
The NCAA argues that college prop bets open the door to abuse, pointing to a recent federal case where more than two dozen people were charged with bribery, wire fraud, and conspiracy. Investigators said the scandal involved over 39 players from 17 Division I men’s basketball teams and aimed to fix nearly 30 games.
However, Missouri regulators chose not to act so soon after sports betting became legal in the state. They explained that changing rules less than two months into the new system would be premature.
“I just don’t feel that I have enough information to grant a request by the NCAA to prohibit this type of sports wagering, because I don’t know enough yet,” commission chair Jan Zimmerman said.
Missouri only became the 39th state to launch a legal sports betting market on December 1, following voters’ narrow approval of a constitutional amendment. The first day saw a whopping 250,000 users register accounts with the state’s new sportsbooks.
Sports Betting Alliance backs Missouri’s rejection
The Sports Betting Alliance told Missouri regulators that its members helped uncover and report the suspicious betting tied to last week’s federal indictment. The group argued that the case shows how licensed sportsbooks can expose wrongdoing, something that would be harder to detect if wagers were placed through unregulated operators.
Made up of Bet365, BetMGM, DraftKings, FanDuel and Fanatics Betting & Gaming, the alliance said the NCAA’s request did not meet the state’s standards for changing rules and “should not trigger a radical change” to Missouri’s new sports betting market.
Others also pushed back against the NCAA proposal. Kansas City bettor Chuck Kucera warned that banning college prop bets would only push gamblers toward “offshore and illegal operators” with fewer protections.
He added, “The NCAA’s efforts would be better directed toward player education, internal compliance, and enforcement of its own rules.”
NCAA continue to reach out to states
Rules for betting on college athletes remain uneven across the country. While every state with legal sports betting allows prop wagers on professional players, the approach to college athletes is different.
Some states permit them freely, others ban them completely, and Missouri sits in the middle by blocking bets on athletes from its own schools but allowing them for other college games.
The NCAA began pressing for tighter rules in 2023, and since then, Louisiana, Maryland, Ohio, and Vermont have adopted bans on individual college prop bets. In his latest appeal to regulators, NCAA President Charlie Baker explained that his office “regularly hears concerns from schools and student-athletes across the country on the impacts of sports betting,” with prop bets often at the center of those complaints.
