USFL Approved For Sports Wagering In 15 States

Published|Updated

The United States Football League has been authorized for sports wagering this spring by 15 states across the country so far, allowing licensed sports wagering operators to accept bets on the inaugural season, which kicks off on Saturday, April 16. 

More states will follow as additional approvals are received, and the legalization of online wagering continues to spread across the country. As of today, sports betting is legal in 33 states, meaning more than 60 percent of American adults can now legally place a bet in their home state. 

Fans can now legally wager on the USFL in Iowa, New Jersey, Oregon, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Connecticut, Delaware, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. The USFL recently announced Sportradar as the League’s Official Sports Data and Integrity Partner.

As the preferred sportsbooks of the USFL's broadcast partners FOX and NBC, Fox Bet and PointsBet, as well as a limited number of sportsbook partners that pay the league a fee for that same privilege, have the first opportunity to purchase the scarce USFL advertising inventory permitted for wagering advertisers. In the unlikely event any inventory remains, other sportsbooks may buy those spots so long as they use the USFL's official data partner, Sportradar, for bets on USFL games. 

The league has already seen strong interest from sportsbooks market wide in making odds on the upcoming USFL season. Football has proven to be far and away the biggest customer acquisition driver for sportsbooks in the United States since the repeal of the ban on sports wagering, so extra football in the spring can only be a positive in the land grab that is currently underway. 

The wagering news adds to what’s already been a busy month for the USFL, which just completed a successful inaugural draft in Birmingham. 

The USFL will play its inaugural game on April 16 at 7:30 p.m. Eastern (6:30 p.m. Central) at Birmingham’s Protective Stadium. The primetime matchup features the New Jersey Generals against the Birmingham Stallions and will be televised live on NBC and FOX. It is the first game to air at the same time on two competitive broadcast networks since Super Bowl I aired on NBC and CBS in 1967.

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Jonathan Hutton is the host of OutKick 360 which breaks down all the latest sports headlines every day from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. ET. Hutton joined OutKick in January of 2021 after nine years as co-host of Midday 180 on 104.5 The Zone, the second highest rated local sports show in the United States. He is well recognized in the Tennessee sports community and spent 16 years on the Tennessee Titans Radio Network, serving as the Gameday Host, sideline reporter, among other roles. Hutton also does television play-by-play for the TSSAA state football and basketball championships on the NFHS Network as well as a freelance sports anchor for WTVF-TV NewsChannel in Nashville. Hutton is a Tennessee native.