ESPN News Services May 9, 2023 3:04 am2 Minute Read
The University of Iowa announced Monday that 26 athletes from five sports (baseball, football, men’s basketball, men’s track and field, wrestling) and one full-time athletic department employee are suspected of violating NCAA rules.
In addition, the state of Iowa acknowledged that about 15 of its athletes in three sports (soccer, wrestling and track and field) are also suspected of violating gambling rules.
Iowa said it has “received information on 111 people,” though only 26 are current athletes.
It was not known if any of the athletes are suspected of having placed bets on competitions in which they participated.
The announcements come days after Alabama fired baseball coach Brad Bohannon as part of an April 28 investigation into suspicious betting activity at the Crimson Tide’s game against LSU, telling ESPN directly about the investigation. This investigation is not yet complete.
NCAA rules prohibit athletes, coaches and employees from betting on amateur, collegiate and professional sports in which the NCAA conducts a championship. For example, athletes cannot wager on NFL games, even if state law would legally allow them to do so, if they were not competing under NCAA rules.
The Iowa Gaming Commission confirmed earlier Monday that it is investigating Iowa’s athletics after the university announced Friday that it had banned athletes from competing for a possible violation of the NCAA.
“There is an ongoing investigation into these matters and we are unable to comment further at this time,” the Iowa Gaming Commission said in a statement. “The commission takes the integrity of gaming in the state seriously and continues to monitor the situation and will provide additional information when possible.”
On Friday, Iowa released a statement saying it had “retained some student-athletes from competition” because of “a possible NCAA violation.” The statement was released after an Iowa-Ohio baseball game in response to why an unnamed student-athlete was not on the lineup.
An NCAA spokesperson told ESPN in an email, “Due to the confidentiality rules implemented by NCAA member schools, the NCAA does not comment on ongoing, pending or potential investigations.”
Iowa is among 33 states that have introduced legal betting markets in the past five years, since a US Supreme Court decision overturned federal law that had restricted regulated sports betting primarily to Nevada.
ESPN’s David Purdum and The Associated Press contributed to this report.