Las Vegas tech company fights illegal college sports betting: “How much bigger will we get than a starting quarterback?”
It is now impossible to watch sporting events on television or online without seeing advertisements for online gambling. Betting on sports has become one huge businessThe American Gaming Association said more than $93 billion was spent on sports gambling last year alone.
As this number continues to increase, so do the scandals. A series of incidents in college sports this year raise questions about the impact of gambling on the integrity of college athletes.
When the Iowa Hawkeyes took on the Iowa State Cyclones in September, five players who didn’t take the field made some of the biggest headlines. All five, including Iowa State’s star quarterback, were sidelined and faced criminal betting charges. Some had even bet on their own teams – something that “just can’t happen,” according to Matt Holt, operator of Las Vegas-based technology company US Integrity.
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U.S. integrity has been maintained by every major college conference and nearly every sports league in the country. It is the watchdog that protects against illegal betting on games and ensures that everything is fair and square.
“I think Iowa and Iowa State was a big eye opener,” Holt said. “How much bigger do we get than a starting quarterback?”
However, this wasn’t the first time US Integrity noticed something was wrong. Months earlier, the company had noticed something strange about betting on a University of Alabama baseball game. Holt alerted state regulators, and in May the school fired its baseball coach for allegedly helping a staff member place bets against his team in a game he was coaching. That, Holt said, was a “five-alarm fire.”
Scott Sadin, chief operating officer of US Integrity, has a background in the hedge fund world, where he analyzed Wall Street transactions to ferret out suspicious trades. Now he’s doing the same with sports data, watching “anything that has regulated sports betting” for any worrisome events. The company focuses on betting lines, odds, social media posts and more to detect suspicious behavior. The company’s biggest concern is that players are trading with inside information. When they find something concerning, leagues, state regulators and the NCAA alert them.
“About 15 to 20 reports go out to sports betting operators and regulators every month,” Sadin said. There are 363 Division 1 teams in college basketball alone, 10 times as many as the National Football League or National Basketball Association, meaning Holt, Sadin and their teams have their hands full.
Gambling scandals have occurred in college sports over the decades, but the prevalence of online gambling is making them even more common. A Division 1 athletic director told CBS News that he and his colleagues are “on high alert” and “scared to death” over recent scandals.
NCAA President Charlie Baker described the threat to the integrity of college sports as “extremely widespread.”
“The fact that now it’s, you know, on your phone, you don’t have to go anywhere to bet but you can do it whenever you want, I think is a real challenge, not just for us but “also for student-athletes,” Baker said.
Holt said he hears such sentiments often.
“They could have happened anywhere,” Holt said. “How could I ever say I don’t believe it’s happening? Because the evidence shows that someone recently dug this well and there was water.”
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