Educating athletes key to ending gambling incidents like in Iowa

AMES — Matthew Holt has no patience, no sympathy for athletes who bet on sporting events in which they compete and then try to influence that competition to win their bet.

Such activity is illegal, and Holt says there is no room for it in sports, no space for forgiveness. However, he expresses genuine concern for another type of sports-betting athlete: the one who is unaware that he or she is breaking a rule or a law.

Holt sat down for an interview last week with The Gazette while he was in Ames to speak to the Iowa State University men’s basketball team and senior sports administration staff. He talked about how U.S. Integrity’s education efforts, its work monitoring sports betting, including in Iowa, and how he got into sports betting monitoring.

At least five Iowa or Iowa State University student-athletes placed illegal bets on games in which they participated, according to charges filed this year by prosecutors. The Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission, which regulates the state’s gambling industry, insists based on the information it has that those athletes did nothing during the games they bet on to attempt to alter the outcome or win their own bets.

In all, a total of 16 current and former Iowa and Iowa State student-athletes and other individuals have been charged with placing illegal bets and tempering with records to conceal their involvement.

More student-athletes beyond those facing charges also may face penalties from the NCAA, the body that governs college athletics, for violating its rules against betting on college sports.

‘We have to get the bad actors out’

Holt views illegal and improper sports bettors in two separate buckets: those athletes who attempt to cheat the system, and those who make a bet without realizing it violates a law or regulation.

“I am not sympathetic to anyone who fixes games, manipulates games, challenges or is a detriment to the integrity of games,” Holt said. “If they get busted, I’m glad to get them out of our ecosystem. I do not want any bad actors. I have spent my entire post-collegiate career in regulated sports betting, and I love regulated sports betting, and I want to see it flourish. And in order for it to flourish, we have to get the bad actors out.

“But I am very sympathetic to the young men and women across the country, both professional and collegiate athletes, who (say), ‘I’m a basketball player. I didn't know I couldn’t bet 20 bucks on Monday Night Football.’ Or, ‘I’m a baseball player and I didn’t know I couldn’t throw 50 bucks on the U.S. to win the World Cup,’ or something like that,” Holt added. “Those guys are not trying to manipulate games. They’re not a detriment to the integrity of our sports. And that’s where I think education can help them.”

Educating athletes

Holt’s meetings with ISU student-athletes and athletic staff last week were among the roughly 40 that U.S. Integrity has held just this summer, Holt said. The sessions mostly have been with college teams and leagues, but the company has done some education work with professional sports leagues, including the Ultimate Fighting Championship.

Holt said sessions typically last about 45 minutes, during which he covers myriad topics. During the sessions, he describes the state of sports betting and the different kinds of bets that people place on sporting events; how sports betting is policed by integrity monitoring companies like his; and the risks associated with placing bets that violate state laws or NCAA rules.

Then Holt fields questions — of which he gets “more … than you would expect,” he said.

“The more we educate folks, the more they’re not going to get caught up in what we would call harmless violations, which is yes, you did violate some law, regulation or policy. But you weren’t a detriment to integrity. You weren’t trying to manipulate any contests,” Holt said. “And in many cases, people take it for granted. They weren’t aware of the rules. Everyone says that everyone knows every rule. Well, I would challenge anyone: grab somebody, even in college or professional athletics (and ask them), ‘Tell me the state laws and regulations in every state.’ Nobody knows them all. It’s easy to trip up.”

Fast track to integrity monitoring CEO

Holt served in the U.S. Air Force and obtained a sports marketing degree from Morehead State University, according to his biography at the U.S. Integrity website. He has worked in regulated gaming ever since his college graduation in 2005, first at the odds aggregator DonBest, and then at Cantor Gaming.

In 2018, as the U.S. Supreme Court was poised to overturn the federal law that prohibited sports wagering in most states, Holt said he noticed that the states that had already created regulatory framework all called for integrity monitoring by an independent company. And at that time, Holt said, no such company existed.

“So we said, ‘OK, well, let’s start a company to fill the regulatory mandate,” Holt said.

That company was U.S. Integrity. “And it’s just sort of taken off since,” Holt said.

U.S. Integrity has almost 170 clients in college and professional athletics, Holt said.

“We’ve tried to maintain the undercharge-overdeliver sort of mission since the beginning. It’s more important for us to have everybody involved than to make money,” Holt said. “At this point, I think we’re making a real impact in this space, which is what really matters most to us.”