The newest Chicago Casino has taken another step forward with a sportsbetting partnership. Hawthone Casino has joined forces with PointsBet sport book.
“We made a beeline to this market, and we really wanted to partner with a great facility and a great tradition, and that’s everything Hawthorne has,” PointsBet CEO Johnny Aitken said at the opening of Hawthorne’s retail sportsbook. “We will be building a state-of-the-art sportsbook facility, and it will be one of the biggest sportsbooks in the world.”
When PointsBet went live in September 2020, both companies made history: Hawthorne became the first horse-racing facility in Illinois to offer live sports betting. The only other places to do that in the U.S. are in New Jersey, at The Meadowlands and Monmouth Park. The partnership, both sides hope, will not only produce a gaming destination, but will help to rejuvenate the Illinois horse-racing business.
PointsBet was the fourth online operator to go live — after BetRivers, DraftKings, and FanDuel — in what promises to be a highly competitive Illinois sports betting market. Illinois so far is the second-biggest state population-wise, behind Pennsylvania, to offer live, legal sports betting.
“Sports betting and horse racing are kind of the same thing,” John Walsh, assistant general manager at Hawthorne, told Sports Handle. “They are different sides of the same coin. In both, you kind of study and try to figure out a way to make some money. There is some crossover, and we figured we could get some people to bet on sports when they come in for horse racing and vice versa.”
Walsh said PointsBet, an Australia-headquartered company that places a premium on horse racing, has already put its money where its mouth is. In the Illinois bill that legalized sports betting, there was little to nothing earmarked for horsemen, but they’ll benefit merely from the existence of casinos at their venues — a percentage of tables games and slots profits are earmarked for the horse-racing purses.
PointsBet was a key sponsor for the Night of Champions harness racing series and chipped in $60,000 to go toward purses.
