amna: We are mere weeks away
from college basketball's March
Madness.
With it, billions of dollars
worth of wagers on the games.
As more states legalize sports
betting, Paul reports on worries
that some colleges are too
involved in its promotion.
A concern since an all -- in all
but four states, residents must
be 21 years old to place a legal
but.
This story is a partnership with
the sports journalism and the
Howard center for investigative
journalism at the university of
Maryland's Merrill college of
journalism.
>> I'm winning and, you know, I
feel like an idiot for not
betting higher and betting more
often.
Reporter: Saul Malek, betting on
sports through an online bookie
at his Texas college in 2017.
>> With my strategy, I can make
hundreds of dollars in a minute.
Reporter: Once, says Malek --
>> I was up a few thousand
credit that week and I lost it
all betting on someone in an
individual tennis game.
And I didn't even know if it was
a man or a woman.
Reporter: Eventually, he owed
nearly 10 different bookies
between $15,000 and $20,000.
In 2018, the U.S. Supreme court
struck down a ban on sports
gambling, making it even easier
to bet.
More than 30 states have
legalized
sports gambling since.
And enticing ads are now
everywhere.
>> $200 instantly.
Reporter: Offering free first
bets.
>> And now five major colleges,
Michigan state, lsu, Maryland,
university of Denver, and the
university of Colorado have
announced multi-year
partnerships with sports betting
companies that include placing
ads at games, along with
promises to, for example, focus
-- focus on response of a gaming
and education.
Colorado was actually paid for
bets made using a university
promo code until that deal
became public.
>> I think it's very scary.
Reporter: Sports economist Andy
zimbalist.
>> There are many colleges now
that are jumping into bed with
sports book companies.
They're allowing the sports book
companies to come onto campus
and to appeal to the students to
get involved in gambling.
Reporter: Hey, I gamble on
sports.
It can be fun.
Sometimes lots of fun.
But, says zimbalist --
>> 6% of betters tend to become
probably more compulsive
-- problem or compulsive
gamblers.
We're talking about tens of
thousands of students who are
likely to become or if they're
not already problem gamblers.
Reporter: Students like these at
the university of Maryland.
>> To introduce something like
gambling on campus seems like
putting kerosene on a fire.
>> If there is supposed to be
some sort of educational aspect
about betting cultures, the
negative ramifications that
betting can have on students,
particularly at a young age, why
aren't we seeing that side of a
program?
Reporter: Now some Maryland
students said they like the
partnership.
But not social work professor
Greg Stewart.
>> I am concerned that certainly
the state of Ohio has made this
an option.
Reporter: Stewart studies
addiction at
the university of Cincinnati in
Ohio,
where sports betting became
legal last month.
>> It's so convenient for people
to engage in this experience.
The use of my phone and I don't
have to go anywhere.
I don't have to talk to anyone.
Reporter: You could do it in
class.
>> You could.
Reporter: And as mit finance
professor Andy lo once told me:
>> Neuroscientists have
documented that the component of
the brain that gets stimulated
when we engage in financial
rewards is really the same
component that is stimulated by
cocaine.
It's the dopamine system.
>> We've seen a big spike since
2018 in risk for gambling
problems.
Reporter: Keith Whyte is
tracking that impact
at the national council on
problem gambling, supported in
part by the gaming industry.
>> Our national surveys between
2018 and 2021 show a roughly 30%
increase in risk for gambling
problems nationwide.
But the majority of that
increase in risk is among those
young male online gamblers.
People with gambling problems
have much higher rates of
substance use and abuse.
But what we're really concerned
about are things like the very,
very high rate of depression
amongst people with gambling
problems, and also a very high
rate of suicidal behavior.
Reporter: College kids,
especially young men, are more
vulnerable than most because
they think they know sports,
they like risk, and they are
comfortable doing everything on
their phones.
>> Much of the promotion that
the gaming companies have sought
to bring to college campuses
seems pretty clearly aimed at
building new customers.
Reporter: And that's the
problem, says former Indiana
governor Mitch Daniels, who
wouldn't allow any betting on
Purdue university sports when he
was, up until recently,
president there.
>> Young people are facing more
emotional and psychological
challenges than they have
before.
At a minimum, schools should be
careful not to be facilitating,
enabling, and while they're
doing so, profiting off the
marketing that might spread this
behavior further.
Reporter: So are they?
All universities declined our
five requests
for interviews.
The university of Colorado sent
a statement.
"The last two years have
demonstrated
that the necessary safeguards
are in place to ensure this
agreement is beneficial and
safe."
The betting companies involved
just didn't respond.
But martin lycka of Europe's
entain did. And his is
one of the world's largest
gambling companies.
>> I strongly believe that any
country, including the united
States, is much better off
having regulated this space and
helped drive out the black
market, the unlicensed
bookmakers that afford their
customers absolutely no
protection tools, no nothing,
than continuing to step in the
dark.
Reporter: If you were running a
university now, would you invite
in your company or another
sports betting company?
Or would you say no, too much
risk, too many young people?
>> I definitely would, because
the young people now are filming
this right after the super bowl,
so all of them arguably would
have gotten exposed to gambling
related adverts and the TV
coverage.
Reporter: But does your company
have any deals with universities
to do advertising, sponsorship
and the like? [00:10:04][6.2]
-- And the like?
>> No.
That is a categorical no.
My company has no commercial
partnerships with universities.
Reporter: And will you never?
>> We never will because of
those reasons you just alluded
to.
Shattering majority of college
students are under age.
They're under 21 and they've got
nothing to do on the gambling
side.
So that is not our target
audience.
Reporter: But how can it not be
the target audience
affirms that partner up?
In which case,
why should universities allow
it?
Welcome us as a former
congressman --
>> I don't think you can stop
sports betting on college
campuses.
Reporter: Also a former Maryland
basketball star,
Tom Mcmillen winces at the
partnerships,
like his own Alma mater's.
>> But this is inevitable.
I think there are risks to
higher education with that, but
it is almost inevitable.
You have this huge sports
enterprise on campuses across
the country.
And so universities are adopting
it much like they adopted, you
know, beer drinking and liquor
in football games.
Reporter: As for Saul Malek, he
went into rehab four years ago
and is still in recovery, still
paying off his debts.
And more worried than ever about
college kids like he once was.
>> It doesn't seem like you
could just go off to college and
lose your entire livelihood
gambling, and you just don't
know any better.
Reporter: Until, for an
estimated tens of thousands
of U.S. Undergrads a year, if
all colleges were to follow
suit, it will be too late.
For the pbs newshour, Paul
Solman.