Nevada officials go on attack against NCAA-sponsored bill to eliminate college betting

Tim Dahlberg

Tuesday, Feb. 1, 2000 | 3:52 a.m.

LAS VEGAS - Nevada officials wasted no time in attacking a proposed ban on college sports betting Tuesday, assailing the NCAA as hypocritical and vowing to fight the legislation in Washington.

Casino mogul Steve Wynn predicted the effort to ban betting on college sports would fail because "ideas that have no truth die."

"This is the dumbest thing I've ever seen," Wynn said. "I think this will go away. It has no legs."

The latest threat to the state's gambling industry brought a sharp response from both the state's congressional delegation and industry representatives.

Nevada Sen. Harry Reid said he intends to introduce legislation of his own this week directing the Justice Department to investigate illegal gambling on college sporting events and on college campuses.

Reid said the NCAA is aiming at the wrong target in backing a bill that would ban betting on both Olympic and college sports in Nevada's legal sports books. He suggested the organization devote more of its own vast resources in stopping illegal betting instead of going after Nevada's legal books.

"While billions of dollars are being generated by college athletics, little of that money is being spent to spread the message that, with a few exceptions, it is illegal to bet on a college game," the Nevada Democrat said. "As a former gaming regulator I know first hand the problem is not the legal sports betting industry, but the back room bookies who are breaking the law every single day."

Rep. Shelly Berkley echoed Reid's view.

"If the NCAA is so concerned about problem gambling, perhaps they should redirect their billions of dollars they make in television contracts and advertising revenues towards addressing students' problems," Berkley said.

Although college sports betting does little for the bottom line of Nevada's casinos, it does bring in customers that might be tempted to spend more of their money elsewhere in the casino.

Nevada sports books took in about $2.4 billion last year - with an estimated one-third of that coming on college sports bets. But the win percentage is small and relatively insignificant.

Still, industry officials said a ban could mean a lot of empty seats in casino sports books on Saturdays in the college football season and during the NCAA basketball tournament, one of the biggest bet sporting events of the year.

"We'd have a very big book that, on Saturdays during the football season, would have a lot of empty seats," Stardust hotel-casino sports book manager Joe Lupo said. "I'd probably get together with the slot manager and see where he could put more slots. You'll still see the sports book available, you'll just see them downsized, that's for sure."

Wynn, chairman of Mirage Resorts Inc., which operates two of the three most lucrative hotel-casinos in Las Vegas, said college students don't wager in Las Vegas because most are under 21 and not allowed to gamble in casinos.

"It's one of the most singularly misguided and off-the-point pieces of Legislation I've seen in my 33 years (in Las Vegas)," Wynn said. "College students gamble with bookies on college campuses. Come show me a college student gambling in our books. They are not there."

Former Nevada Gaming Control Board Chairman Bill Bible agreed.

"If we are trying to eradicate the problem of illegal sports wagering and the betting scandals it has caused throughout the country, this legislation misses the target entirely," said Bible, now head of the Nevada Resort Association. "This proposal singles out Nevada, where no sports betting scandals have been reported, and totally ignores issues like illegal wagering on college campuses."

Frank Fahrenkopf, director of the American Gaming Association, said he has already started lobbying efforts against the bill, and plans to meet later this week with one of its sponsors, Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy.

Fahrenkopf said he doubted the issue would advance far this year because a shortened session during a presidential election year. But he cautioned that the bill could gain momentum if not vigorously fought.

"This is the kind of issue that can pick up speed," he said.