Thirteen men’s college basketball players from six schools were involved in gambling schemes, including betting against their own team, game manipulation and sharing information with third parties for gambling purposes, the NCAA announced Thursday.
Players formerly associated with Eastern Michigan, Temple, Arizona State, New Orleans, North Carolina A&T and Mississippi Valley State are under investigation for gambling violations, according to the NCAA, which declined to name the athletes until the infractions process has concluded. None of the players are currently enrolled at the schools where the infractions occurred, according to the NCAA.
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The violations include athletes betting on and against their own teams, sharing information with third parties for purposes of betting, knowingly manipulating scoring or game outcomes and/or refusing to participate in the enforcement staff’s investigation. The NCAA said additional sports betting cases are at varying stages.
The NCAA said some third parties are involved in multiple cases and that they were aware of how some players were compromised in the schemes, but declined to give specifics.
“The rise of sports betting is creating more opportunity for athletes across sports to engage in this unacceptable behavior, and while legalized sports betting is here to stay, regulators and gaming companies can do more to reduce these integrity risks by eliminating prop bets and giving sports leagues a seat at the table when setting policies,” NCAA president Charlie Baker said in a release.
Schools and respective staffs in the ongoing cases are not alleged to have been involved in the violations, and the enforcement staff is not seeking penalties for the institutions, the NCAA said in its release.
ESPN previously reported that betting accounts associated with a gambling ring under federal investigation placed wagers deemed suspicious by bookmakers against Temple, Eastern Michigan, North Carolina A&T, Mississippi Valley State and New Orleans over the past two seasons.
The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania is investigating a gambling ring with ties to the NBA betting scandal involving former player Jontay Porter, according to multiple sources.
Sportsbooks first began noticing suspicious betting patterns on select college basketball games — often on the point spreads and over/under totals on first halves — during the 2023-24 season. A Temple game against UAB on March 7, 2024, attracted scrutiny after the point spread on the full game moved from UAB -2 to as high as -8. Multiple U.S. sportsbooks halted betting on the game, and an integrity monitor sent out alerts to its clients. UAB won 100-72.
The following season, two games involving Eastern Michigan were flagged for unusual betting activity, and four players from the University of New Orleans were suspended from the team last season as part of a gambling investigation, according to multiple sources.
