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With legal sports betting barely two months old in Missouri, state regulators have rejected a request from the NCAA to pull the plug on player prop bets and certain halftime wagers tied to college games.
NCAA Gets a Hard Pass
The Missouri Gaming Commission voted 3–0 to keep current rules in place, saying it’s too early to start rewriting regulations. Legal sports betting only launched on December 1, 2025, and commissioners want more time and data before deciding whether these markets pose a real risk to integrity.
Missouri already bars prop bets involving in-state college teams. That means you can’t bet on a Mizzou quarterback’s passing yards, but you’re free to wager on a Big Ten player in a different game. That places Missouri in the middle of the regulatory pack—not too loose, not too tight.
Commission Chair Jan Zimmerman summed it up: there’s not enough information yet to justify sweeping changes. Executive Director Mike Leara echoed that, citing limited data from Missouri’s brand-new betting market.
NCAA’s Push Comes After Scandal
The NCAA’s request came hot on the heels of a major point-shaving scandal that saw over 39 players from 17 different NCAA Division I basketball programs accused of trying to rig more than two dozen games. The case has reignited long-running concerns that prop bets—wagers tied to individual player stats or performance—are too easy to manipulate.
NCAA President Charlie Baker sent letters to every state gambling regulator last week, urging bans on prop bets and other “specialty” wagers like halftime spread bets. Four states—Louisiana, Maryland, Ohio, and Vermont—have already taken action since 2023 to eliminate these types of bets. More, including Indiana and New York, are weighing their own restrictions.
Sportsbooks Fire Back
Missouri regulators opened the issue to public comment before Thursday’s vote, and the industry didn’t stay quiet. The Sports Betting Alliance, a group representing DraftKings, FanDuel, Bet365, and others, argued that licensed sportsbooks are the best defense against game-fixing. If something shady happens, they can report it. Offshore sites won’t.
In their view, banning prop bets just pushes gamblers to riskier platforms. The alliance also pointed out that the NCAA’s request doesn’t meet Missouri’s standard for a rule change.
One local bettor, Chuck Kucera, wrote to the commission with a blunt take: if the NCAA wants to clean up the game, it should focus on education and enforcement, not banning wagers that already exist in a regulated environment.
Bettors Stay in Play—For Now
For everyday Missouri bettors, nothing changes. You can still place player prop bets on college games, unless a Missouri team is on the field. Regulators made it clear the issue could come up again once more betting data rolls in, but for now, the market stands.
Nationwide, the issue remains deeply divided. Some states are rushing to limit college prop bets in the name of athlete protection, while others are holding their ground, wary of driving bettors underground without hard evidence that the bets themselves are to blame.
