Almost $17 Million for DE in First Month of Football Season

The numbers for Delaware’s football season have so far made a big impact on the state’s bottom line. The state’s Lottery reported that just under $17 million in sportsbook wagers were taken for the first month of the NFL and college football seasons. This amount is more than twice the amount the sportsbooks took in for the previous period.

First Month of Football

From August 27^th through September 30^th, the lottery reports that the state took in $16,830,010 in wagers. For the period before that, from July 29^th through August 26^th, the state took in only $7.7 million in wagers.

The average daily handle for this past month’s sportsbooks was $481,000, showing that football season, being the most popular betting sport for Americans, is having a huge impact on the numbers.

The sportsbook operators brought in $3.15 million in revenue for the period ending on September 30^th.

Legal Sports Betting in Delaware

Sportsbooks operators opened for business on June 5^th, making the state the first outside of Nevada to offer legal sports betting. The haste with which the state fully legalized sports gambling after the Supreme Court’s decision in May to overturn the federal ban on sports betting (PASPA) was only possible because Delaware already had a legal form of sports betting in place since 2009.

Delaware moved so fast on opening its three sportsbooks for legal sports betting, in fact, that it beat out New Jersey, which is the state that actually fought the case that ended PASPA.

Individual Casinos

As there’s not yet online wagering in Delaware, the numbers are from the state’s three brick-and-mortar sportsbooks. Like in previous months, most of the wagering came from Delaware Park, for a total of $11.6 million wagered and $2.2 million in revenue.

At Dover Downs, bettors wagered $3.3 million and the sportsbooks saw $608,000 in revenue.

Harrington Raceway came in third with $2 million wagered and $378,000 in revenue to the sportsbooks.

What’s Included in the Numbers

NFL parlay wagering bets, which are bets that are placed on the outcomes of multiple games, don’t count in the Lottery’s numbers. Parlay wagering is allowed in approximately 100 different lottery retail locations all over the state. This type of betting has been legal since before the federal ban on sports betting was overturned by the Supreme Court in May. Bettors participating in parlay wagering placed $6.4 million in wagers and the state held around $2.2 million of that amount.

New Jersey’s Numbers

Delaware’s numbers don’t come anywhere near those of New Jersey, which has a much higher population. The Garden State has eight brick-and-mortar sportsbooks and eight online sportsbooks, and combined, these sportsbooks accepted around $100 million in wagers in the month of August. It’s expected that NJ’s sports betting numbers will be much higher for September.