Adam Minter: The NCAA is opening the door to more gambling scandals

The men’s college basketball season is tipping off under a cloud of betting scandals.

Last week the National Collegiate Athletic Association announced that six former Division I players manipulated games and shared information with bettors for financial benefit. The NCAA responded by revoking their eligibility – effectively a lifetime ban from college sports competition.

These athletes represent a growing problem. In September the association revoked the eligibility of three other players for betting-related offenses, and by late October it was investigating approximately 30 current and former players for similar issues (with some cases already resolved).

Meanwhile, government investigators, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, are conducting their own wide-ranging inquiry into gambling-related corruption of college basketball. According to ESPN, which first reported the news, indictments could be forthcoming.

These infractions have received scant attention compared to recent gambling scandals that have embarrassed the National Basketball Association and Major League Baseball. But they deserve just as much focus.

Basketball, a game of small teams in which individuals have an outsized impact, has always been a favorite target of unscrupulous gamblers in search of on-court collaborators. College basketball’s thousands of poorly compensated athletes raise the level of vulnerability – one that poses among the most serious integrity risks in American sports.

Ever since college athletes were granted the right to profit from their name, image and likeness, the divide between the haves and the have-nots across the 365 NCAA Division I men’s basketball programs – split among high-, mid- and low-major conferences – has come into sharper focus. The labels are informal, but they’re a widely embraced means of understanding the financial and competitive muscle that different programs bring to their sports.

Players in the top conferences – which account for roughly 80 of the schools – have drawn attention for their eye-popping earnings. According to the Athletic, those colleges are expected to spend an average of more than $8 million on their rosters for the 2025-26 season. The teams’ starters can earn millions, and many expect to keep the money flowing by eventually playing professionally (abroad, if not at home).

However, most Division I basketball programs can’t afford those rosters or salaries. The financial gap is especially stark when compared to low-major conferences, which comprise around 140 schools. In a March post on X, Craig Doty, head coach at one of those institutions – Houston Christian University – said that ballers at that level earn an average of $5,000 to $15,000 total for the academic year.

It’s an earnings divide that most athletes accept. Not everyone has the talent to play at a top program like, for example, UConn.

But bad actors, capitalizing on the rise of legal sports betting, are exploiting athletes’ financial vulnerabilities. For example, they can offer players money to manipulate their on-court performance to help fulfill so-called prop bets. These wagers target individual player outcomes such as points scored, assists and rebounds. More ambitious gamblers might try to fix entire games.

The NCAA’s most recent finding reveals that these scenarios aren’t speculative. Of the six athletes cited by the association last week, five played for low-major schools – the University of New Orleans and Mississippi Valley State. In one instance, two athletes allegedly discussed receiving $5,000 for their involvement.

High-major basketball isn’t immune to corruption risks. That’s partly because sporting communities are tight-knit: many Division I players, across sports, have known each other since childhood. Sensitive information – such as injury reports – can pass between them for innocent reasons. But it can also be shared for less scrupulous ones. For example, one of the six athletes caught by the NCAA played at high-major Arizona State and allegedly passed information to a player at mid-major Fresno State, who then bet on the game.

Hopefully the NCAA’s enforcement actions will scare a few athletes into abiding by the association’s rules. But the threat of consequences alone is unlikely to stamp out corruption. Looking at lower-tier leagues around the world shows why: poorly compensated players have long been favorite targets for match-fixers. These scandals happen frequently, and often at a scale that dwarfs anything seen – so far – in the U.S.

That should serve as a warning. As gambling becomes more deeply embedded into American sports, the NCAA must do more to dissuade athletes from seeing it as a potential side gig and reduce their opportunities to wager. The ban on college athletes betting on college sports is wise; so too is the association’s recent push to eliminate prop bets on its games.

But shockingly, the NCAA – rather than further limit opportunities for college athletes to bet – is looking to expand them. Last month, the association adopted a rule that would enable college athletes at all levels to wager on professional sports. The rationale, according to the association, is to better align athletes with their non-athlete campus peers who can legally bet on sports and lift any stigma associated with seeking help for problem gambling. At the same time, the association believes the policy shift will free up resources that can be used to protect college games from betting scandals (such as those that have been recently uncovered).

It’s a dangerous and nonsensical idea. After all, college athletes often maintain close relationships with professional athletes, some of whom are former teammates, creating dangerous temptations to bet off inside information. Facing pushback from influential members, the NCAA has delayed implementation of the new rule until Nov. 22.

If the NCAA is really serious about addressing its emerging college basketball scandal, it’ll kill the rule entirely. Making college basketball a more welcoming place for wagers will only raise corruption risks. A better approach is to start exploring ways for conferences and the NCAA to help compensate athletes at low- and mid-major schools. It’ll be expensive but far less costly than the reputational damage that comes with recurring gambling scandals.

Adam Minter is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering the business of sports. He is the author, most recently, of “Secondhand: Travels in the New Global Garage Sale.”