NCAA Ban on Student-Athletes Betting on Pro Sports to Stay in Place

A rule that would have gone into place this month and allowed student-athletes to bet on professional sports has been rescinded.

Participating schools and conferences in Divisions I, II, and III have agreed to keep the prohibition on sports wagers on pro sports in place for NCAA athletes.

This completes a quick reversal by the NCAA. In October, the board of directors of Division I voted to allow athletes to bet on pro sports only. That new rule would have gone into place by November 1. Officials in Div. II and Div. III followed with their approval of a rule change.

But schools have started to peel away from the new rule. The start date was delayed twice, and now the SEC, Big 10, and other conferences have removed support.

In Missouri, where legal sports betting will launch on Dec. 1, the most prominent university in that state has aligned itself with a ban on professional sports betting.

"Mizzou Athletics is aligned with the SEC, whose 16-member institutions voted to rescind the NCAA’s proposed pro sports gambling rule,” Dave Matter, associate athletics director at Mizzou said in a statement this week.

When the NCAA announced its intention of permitting wagering on pro sports by its athletes, it did so with reportedly less than 75 percent of schools in support. Gradually, opponents started to chip away, and with fewer schools aligned with the new rule, major conferences like the SEC removed their support.

Scandals like the one that resulted in the arrest of Portland Trailblazers head coach Chauncey Billups over alleged illegal gambling have led to concerns from many in the sporting world about expansion of gambling.

Also in recent months, two pitchers on the Cleveland Guardians were placed on leave by MLB as they face investigations over whether they manipulated their own player prop markets. Both men, Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz, allegedly placed wagers on themselves regarding so-called "micro-bets." That form of wager is also coming under scrutiny by lawmakers and the NCAA.

All three levels of NCAA sports could later reverse course on betting by college student-athletes, but without as much as 25% support by teams in the Big 10 and SEC, reportedly, it seems unlikely any time soon.

College athletes are also banned from wagering on college sporting events, as well.