NCAA Denies Reinstatement for Texas Tech QB Brendan Sorsby After He Placed Nearly 3,000 Bets, Including on Own Team

A hearing in Brendan Sorsby’s case against the NCAA is scheduled for Monday in a Lubbock, Texas courtroom. The Texas Tech quarterback was denied reinstatement earlier in the week after the school placed him on indefinite leave in late April 2026. Texas Tech signed Sorsby to a $4 million deal after he transferred from Indiana.

The Red Raiders placed him on leave in adherence to the NCAA’s gambling policy guidelines after he completed a 35-day stint at a gambling rehabilitation center in Arizona. The school appealed the NCAA decision on Friday. Court documents showed that while at Indiana, Sorsby placed at least 2,900 wagers amounting to over $30,000 from June 2022 to December 2023.

Forty of those bets were connected to the Hoosiers football team. Court filings also revealed that the NCAA received a tip from an online gambling bookmaker on March 11. The NCAA discovered that Sorsby made parlay bets linked to Hoosier basketball games.

He asked friends for help to wager on different sports across several sportsbooks including FanDuel, Underdog, Hard Rock Bet, and PrizePicks. Sorsby transferred $5,000 to someone who placed bets on the NBA, MLB, and PGA for him while he was at Texas Tech. Sorsby wrote in an affidavit that he transferred at least $60,000 to friends who were betting on his behalf.

“It became a habit for me to bet,” he stated. He was diagnosed with a gambling and anxiety disorder. Sorsby wrote in the affidavit: “My betting became a compulsion which made it virtually impossible to resist the constant notifications I received from betting apps.

I lost complete control of my addiction. ” The NCAA is aware of Sorsby’s rehab trip and denies being insensitive to the mental health angle deployed by Texas Tech and his attorneys. In a legal brief put together late Friday, the NCAA claimed its decision to deny Sorsby an injunction should stand.

“Bylaws are clear that his college football career has come to an end,” the NCAA stated in the brief reported by ESPN’s David Purdum. The NCAA pledged not to become the first major American sports league to allow an athlete to bet on their own games to compete if a district court grants Sorsby an injunction.

” The NCAA is comfortable with Sorsby pursuing his football career elsewhere but insists it won’t be in a Red Raider jersey or on any campus under their control.