SEC commissioner Greg Sankey shares his thoughts on legalized sports gambling
Sports gambling has been a hot-button topic around sports since May, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a federal law prohibiting states from legalizing single-game sports betting. On Monday, SEC commissioner Greg Sankey explained it has been talked about within his conference well before this summer.
Sankey spoke at SEC Media Days on Monday and explained how sports betting will affect college athletics. He explained members of the SEC staff have talked about and learned about legalized sports gambling since 2011 in an effort to be well prepared.
Along with the past conversations with SEC staff, Sankey said the conference has been in contact with representatives from the NFL, NBA, MLB and the PGA offices to understand how the professional leagues will handle such developments.
“Gambling activity around sports is not new, and that includes gambling activity around collegiate sports. What is new is the expansion of legalized sports gambling and the increased cultural acceptance of legalized sports gambling,” Sankey said. “For us, the integrity of our games is of the utmost importance. While it may be preferred to have no expansion of gambling activity, what is needed now is for our state and federal legislative leaders to enact policies that properly support the integrity of our games and provide the necessary protections for our students and our student-athletes.”
Sankey was asked later if there’s an outlined plan for the conference if states that have SEC schools legalize sports betting. Sankey said there was not a plan and reiterated how the conference is monitoring the potential situations regarding gambling.
“There are two parts to the question — monitoring what’s happening at a state and national level from a policy standpoint. That’s the communication with other leagues, both at the college and professional level,” Sankey said. “Then [there’s] the discussion of should we be in the habit of subscribing to a service that analyzes our games because there are strange things that might happen around the line. We’ve not done that yet, but it’s certainly a topic of conversation.”
As far as SEC states, Mississippi is expected to see its casinos soon offer single-game sports bets thanks to language crafted into its fantasy sports law, which was ratified in 2017. In Georgia, Republican gubernatorial candidates Casey Cagle and Brian Kemp oppose legalized sports betting in the state, while Democratic candidate Stacey Abrams told The Telegraph she would only support it if the tax revenue raised went toward educational opportunities for Georgia students.