Rovell: How Much of a Haircut Will College Football Betting Take? Maybe None.
Ron Jenkins/Getty Images. Pictured: Delarrin Turner.
If only three of the Power 5 conferences – the SEC, Big 12 and ACC – can play a full season, how much betting revenue would be lost?
Before we even take a guess, overall handle on college football could still wind up in the positive versus last year.
How? Well, we’ll have at least six new states offering some sort of betting that didn’t have it last year, including Colorado and Illinois. And it’s possible that before the end of the year, Virginia, Tennessee and longshot Massachusetts could also be in play.
[Where Is Sports Betting Legal? Tracking All 50 States]
That results in a lot more legal bettors, who might just blow their typical bankroll on the slate that is available. Can’t bet on Michigan and Oklahoma? Put what you would typically split between both just on Oklahoma.
In a typical year, the SEC, Big 12 and ACC make up 50-60% of the total handle for college football, according to those in the know.
Longtime oddsmaker Danny Sheridan told The Action Network that he thought those conferences made up about 60% of the handle, while the Superbook’s Jay Kornegay put it at closer to 50%.
“It’s a tough one to guess since we don’t have a (internal) report that breaks it down,” Kornegay said.
CG Technology’s Dave Sharapan agreed with the two, saying it was in between 50% and 60%. When asked to rank the conferences by handle, Sharapan put the SEC first, then the Big Ten and the Pac-12, followed by the Big 12 and the ACC.
We went to our BetLabs data to see how many bets were tracked on college football teams over the last decade.
Among the top-five teams drawing the largest volume of bets, four of them are in conferences that are still planning on playing: Alabama (#1), Clemson (#2), LSU (#4) and Oklahoma (#5).
In fact, 11 of of the top-20 teams (55%) are still planning on playing, including Georgia (#12), Florida State (#13), Auburn (#15), Texas (#16)
Florida (#17), Texas A&M (#18) and Oklahoma State (#19).
Over the last 15 years, 14 of the college football playoff champions have come from the conferences that are still playing. The SEC has won 10 of the last 15, the ACC has three, the Big 12 has one and the Big 10 has one.
Most Bet On College Football Teams Over the Last 10 Years (Source: BetLabs)
- Alabama, SEC
- Clemson, ACC
- Ohio State, Big Ten
- LSU, SEC
- Oklahoma, Big 12
- Oregon, Pac-12
- Notre Dame, Independent
- Stanford, Pac-12
- USC, Pac-12
- Wisconsin, Big Ten
- Michigan, Big Ten
- Georgia, SEC
- Florida State, ACC
- Michigan State, Big Ten
- Auburn, SEC
- Texas, Big 12
- Florida, SEC
- Texas A&M, SEC
- Oklahoma State, Big 12
- Nebraska, Big Ten
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