Missouri gambling regulators rejected a request from the NCAA to restrict wagers on the performance of college athletes, the Associated Press reported Thursday. The Missouri Gaming Commission said it did not yet have enough information to prohibit the type of sports wagering at issue, while leaving open the possibility of revisiting the question later.
The action followed quickly on an NCAA letter to state gambling oversight boards asking them to ban college athlete prop bets. The NCAA also urged states to restrict other specialty bets, including wagers on whether a team will trail by a particular point spread at halftime.
NCAA President Charlie Baker said in his letter that his office “regularly hears concerns from schools and student-athletes across the country on the impacts of sports betting,” including about prop bets. The NCAA argued that bets on college athletes’ in-game performance are “ripe for manipulation by athletes facing pressure, harassment or bribes from bettors,” and pointed to a recent federal indictment.
That indictment, the AP reported, charged more than two dozen people for alleged bribery, wire fraud and conspiracy in a scheme involving more than 39 players on more than 17 NCAA Division I men’s basketball teams attempting to rig more than 29 games. The NCAA’s request, regulators said, comes amid a young betting market in Missouri.
Jan Zimmerman, chair of the Missouri Gaming Commission, said in a statement that she “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.” The AP reported that Missouri officials also said they did not want to change state rules less than two months after legal sports betting launched in the state.
Missouri began allowing sports betting on Dec. 1 under a state constitutional amendment that narrowly won voter approval. The AP noted that the state was the 39th—and latest—state to allow sports betting after the U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for states to adopt legal wagering in 2018. Through the first 11 months of 2025, legal sportsbooks generated $15 billion in revenue, up over 17% from the same period a year earlier, according to the American Gaming Association, though the AP said Missouri had not yet reported its initial sports betting revenues.
The AP said prop bet rules for college athletes vary widely across states. It reported that more than a dozen states place no limits on collegiate prop bets, while nearly an equal number prohibit all such bets. Missouri, the AP reported, is among states with middle-ground limits: it prohibits prop bets on athletes playing in games involving Missouri colleges and universities but allows them for all other collegiate games.
The AP also reported that since the NCAA began encouraging states in 2023 to adopt restrictions on bets involving college athletes, Louisiana, Maryland, Ohio and Vermont have joined others that ban individual prop bets on college athletes. Missouri’s decision, coming after the NCAA letter, drew responses from the betting industry.
In written comments to the Missouri Gaming Commission, a sports betting industry group argued that restricting college athlete prop bets would be unwarranted. The AP reported that the Sports Betting Alliance said its members played an integral role in detecting and disclosing the unscrupulous betting involved in the federal indictment, and argued that legal sportsbooks helped authorities identify wrongdoing that might otherwise go undetected.
The AP said the alliance argued the NCAA request did not meet Missouri’s criteria for regulatory revisions and “should not trigger a radical change” to the state’s new sports betting industry. Other commenters opposed limits as well, according to the AP.
In written comments, Kansas City sports wagerer Chuck Kucera said restricting prop bets on college athletes would drive gamblers to “offshore and illegal operators” with fewer consumer protections. He also wrote that the NCAA’s efforts would be better directed toward player education, internal compliance, and enforcement of its own rules.
As Missouri continues to establish its sports betting market, the AP reported the commission’s stance leaves the possibility of future changes—while declining, for now, to follow the NCAA’s request for an immediate ban on college athlete prop bets.