Poker peaks list of popular college pastimes

By Matthew Meyerhofer

Every Monday, Santa Clara sophomore Ben Marsh gathers with ten to twenty of his best friends to participate in what could be the new national collegiate pastime: gambling.

According to Marsh, it's just a good way to spend time with friends.

"Even if you lose the five dollar buy in, you still get the enjoyment of hanging out for a couple hours," Marsh said.

Ross Mathews, the president of Santa Clara's Card Club, said the recent surge in campus poker playing comes as no surprise to him.

"With the increasing popularity of televised poker, kids around Santa Clara have rushed to buy poker chips, save gambling cash, and have a nice deck of cards to play with," Mathews said.

Gambling-style events have certainly found their place on campus at Santa Clara. The Santa Clara Card Club regularly hosts poker tournaments and the Residence Hall Association holds an annual "Casino Night." These events have proven popular, luring students with real prizes despite the free admission.

Mathews attributes much of the growth in poker popularity on college campuses to the increased publicity given to professional poker on networks such as ESPN, which covered the World Series of Poker last year. The tournament, held every April, awards $2.5 million to the winner.

However, Mathews said potential gamblers should be wary in thinking that gambling is going to earn them some quick, easy cash.

"Going to Vegas â€" or any card room for that matter â€" with insufficient poker experience could result in either lots of lost money or the quickest $100 you've ever lost," Mathews said.

Mathews, who said he has ten years of poker experience under his belt , recommended that aspiring poker players practice quite a bit of "Texas Hold 'em" and read some books on the subject before tackling casino gambling.

But whether or not college students are bigger gamblers than the rest of the adult population is unclear. Different studies have yielded varying results, so no one is particularly sure how much gambling has become a part of campus culture.

According to a Harvard Medical School survey published April 14, college students are less likely to gamble than the rest of the adult population, contradicting the findings of many earlier studies.

Harvard's study found that 42 percent of college students gambled in the past year, whereas a recent national survey conducted by American Demographics found that 82 percent of adults in general have done so. Of the 10,765 college students surveyed by Harvard, 2.6 percent gambled at least weekly during the school year, compared to 23 percent of adults in general.

These figures contradict the findings of a recent survey conducted by the Minnesota Institute of Public Health, which concluded that 82 percent of all college students are gamblers, with 12 percent gambling more than once a week.

According to Timothy Urdan, a Santa Clara associate professor of psychology, there are a couple of reasons why gambling may be enticing to young people.

"Adolescents are not particularly good at thinking realistically about the future," Urdan said. "If you tell an adolescent that their current interest in gambling may develop into a lifelong addiction, they will likely say, 'Not to me.'"

Urdan added that denial of the possible negative consequences is often also coupled with unrealistic optimism.

"More than older people, adolescents tend to think they will be rich and famous without much regard for what it takes to be rich and famous, or with their actual skills," he said. "So adolescents may be more likely than older adults to think they will score big in gambling, and this may make gambling more attractive to them."

The Native American gaming casinos have traditionally been the gambling destination for students younger than 21 who are looking to wager a little bit of cash. However, this option may become less available in the near future as the casinos look to raise their profiles, and their profit margins.

Cache Creek Casino Resort, just outside of Sacramento, has decided to raise their age minimum to 21 as part of an expansion project that includes more luxurious accommodations, as well as building an 18-hole golf course.

However, if one avenue of gaming is slowly closing to under-21 gamblers, there is another one that has opened remarkably quickly. Internet gambling is becoming increasingly popular, and with easy registration and free credit enticements, more college students are signing up every day.

Marsh admitted he just picked up on Internet gambling three weeks ago, when he got $15 of free gambling money for signing up.

"So far, I've profited by a couple dollars," Marsh said. But when asked how often he goes online to bet, he admitted, "I'm getting bad, almost an hour a day, maybe two."

According to a report published by Christiansen Capital Advisors, the Internet gambling industry brought in $4.5 billion in revenue in 2002, and they predict that revenue in 2005 could exceed $10 billion. InformaMedia Group, a company that tracks electronic gambling, predicts that online gaming revenue may reach $14.5 billion by 2006.

There are some who feel collegiate gamblers should receive more encouragement. Professional poker player Lou Krieger and online poker giant Royal Vegas Poker are hosting their first ever College Poker Championships this year. The tournament is being conducted largely online and runs from January through June, offering a $50,000 grand prize to the winner.

"Though there are critics of gambling, many miss the positives of this activity: it promotes analytical skills dealing with statistics, odds and probability, but mostly, it creates a sense of camaraderie among friends," Mathews said.

û Contact Matthew Meyerhofer at (408) 554-4546 or mmeyerhofer@scu.edu.