Sports Gambling on College Campuses

It’s Sunday, you have waited all week to watch football, and now it’s finally here, “Seven hours of commercial free football starts right now!” Host of NFL RedZone, Scott Hansen says. It’s what Dylan Delaney has been anticipating all week, it’s time to see how his football bets pan out this given Sunday.

            Dylan is a sophomore here at Colorado State University, “I bet Eagles on the spread, and Viking’s money line,” Dylan said. The Eagles game versus the Lions is at 2:05 Eastern time. That means Dylan had to get his bet in before the game started. Dylan then rooted his Eagles on as they won big over the Lions 44-6, beating the spread of -3.5. That means the Eagles had to win by at least 3.5 points for Dylan’s bet to win him some money. 

Three college roommates watching NFL games in Fort Collins, Colo., Sunday, December 12, 2021. The roommates spent their Sunday enjoying some NFL football and sports gambling on the games.                       

            “I usually do my betting for before the football games Saturday night or Sunday morning, it depends on how excited I am for the games,” Dylan said. “It’s really popular here at CSU, a lot of the people in my fraternity enjoy it.”

With sports betting being a new trend in our entertainment world, there are only 32 states that it is legal in and only 28 in which sports betting is already happening. With popular platforms like FanDuel, Draft Kings Sportsbook and a new up and coming one Barstool Sportsbook.            

College roommates sports betting on NFL games in their house, Sunday Dec. 12, 2021. In Fort Collins Colo., enjoying some wings and hoping their bets cash out.

“I started getting into sports gambling when I turned 21, my friends had been doing it for a while, so I got into it and haven’t looked back,” Dylan said. When you have all these legal gambling sites than it becomes a lot easier to get into sports betting. Due to the exponential growth of sports betting it’s not all rainbows and butterfly’s, there is a social dilemma with the morality of the hobby.   

Dr. Timothy Fong is a Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA, “We’re now in a phase where the nation has an appetite for sports betting,” Dr. Timothy Fong said. “It’s created this new form of entertainment that society has approved, but that form of entertainment does have a potential for addiction.”

“I don’t see my gambling affect my life in a negative way, have I lost some money, of course, but it’s all in the spirit of fun,” Dylan said. The college undergraduate says he will continue to gamble casually, but can’t wait for next Sunday when his favorite team, the Eagles take on the Los Angeles Chargers.

People are throwing wads of cash at sportsbooks around the country: over $100 billion every year on and that’s just on football.  The future of sports gambling will also have a major impact on similar websites like fantasy football websites. With the growth of daily sports betting fantasy lineup-based teams may seek to exist in the near future.

Fantasy football’s tenure of popularity is up soon with the growth of sports betting, it is easier and more rewarding. Rather than having to put a whole team together on an app you can just go chose who wins and win money from that.

            With sports gambling engulfing CSU’s campus, it has created a community, something for the students to help distract themselves from an onerous school year.

An infographic that helps explain the popularity and navigation of sports gambling.

Data from: Navigate