The opportunity to gather with friends and family, eat loads of food and celebrate the spirit of gratitude makes Thanksgiving a treasured holiday in the United States. But the biggest attraction for most sports fans is the day's NFL slate, with the week surrounding it also offering up a heaping helping of tremendous action from across the sports landscape.
Between the NFL's traditional Thanksgiving games and more recent Black Friday games, college football Rivalry Week, college basketball Feast Week, MLS Cup playoffs, as well as full NHL and NBA slates, Thanksgiving week is one of the biggest sports betting weeks of the year, with multiple sportsbooks reporting it as one of their highest handle weeks on the calendar.
"While numbers vary annually, this stretch easily rivals other marquee periods like NFL Week 1, the opening rounds of March Madness, NFL Wild Card Weekend paired with the College Football Playoff semifinals, and divisional weekend alongside the national championship," Caesars Sportsbook's head of football Joey Feazel told ESPN via email. "It's a week that keeps the sportsbook buzzing and one we anticipate all year long."
The presence of all the other sports is nothing to scoff at, but the NFL is still king on Thanksgiving, as it tends to be throughout the fall and winter.
In 2024, the NFL commanded 79% of the handle during Thanksgiving week, well outpacing college basketball (13%) in second and college football (5%) in third, according to BetMGM data. The book also notes that all three Thanksgiving games ranked in the top 20% of the most-bet NFL games of the year, including playoffs.
"It's always a very popular week and, specifically talking to NFL, those Thanksgiving games often are some of the most-bet-on regular season games of the season," BetMGM senior trading manager Christian Cipollini told ESPN. "A lot factors into that. Most people aren't working, usually there's decent games on, you got the games throughout the day."
Cipollini also says that the quality of the games on Thanksgiving can factor into how much handle they ultimately attract, and that shouldn't be a problem in 2025. Going into the week, all three games show a spread of seven points or fewer, per ESPN BET odds; if it holds, that would make it the sixth time since the Thanksgiving slate expanded to three games in 2006 that all the games had spreads within a touchdown.
The largest spread of the day belongs to the prime-time matchup, with the Baltimore Ravens giving seven points to the Cincinnati Bengals -- though that line has already moved down from 10.5 at open, and could fall further now that quarterback Joe Burrow is expected to make his long-anticipated return from a toe injury.
The late-afternoon game between the Kansas City Chiefs (-3) and Dallas Cowboys is the next closest matchup, with the early-afternoon NFC North showdown between the Green Bay Packers and Detroit Lions (-2.5) representing the tightest spread of the day.
Between the quality of the matchup and BetMGM's heavy presence in Michigan, Cipollini expects the early game to attract a robust handle: In 2024, the Lions' matchup with the Chicago Bears was the most-bet Thanksgiving game in the book's history.
The fun continues into Black Friday when the Bears go on the road to face the Philadelphia Eagles. With Philly giving seven points to Chicago, the matchup doesn't immediately come off as a close one on paper, but this season's spread is the tightest in the three-year history of the Black Friday NFL game. The contest could also attract high handle given the showdown between two likely NFC playoff teams.
"I don't think the general public can get enough of good football," DraftKings Sportsbook director Johnny Avello told ESPN, noting that a lesser-quality game would not attract as large of a handle regardless of its positioning on Black Friday. "The consumer is home on Thursday watching these three games, and then Friday we get another big game."
On that Friday, the NFL will not have a monopoly on quality football games, as three of the top six teams in the College Football Playoff rankings will be in action for rivalry games. Further, two of those teams -- Ole Miss and Texas A&M -- will be going on the road, and the third -- Georgia -- will play at a neutral site.
Then, on Saturday, college football Rivalry Week continues with one of the perennially most-anticipated games of the season, Ohio State versus Michigan. The Buckeyes are either 9.5- or 10-point road favorites depending on the book. Other marquee rivalries on Saturday include Oregon-Washington, Vanderbilt-Tennessee and Alabama-Auburn.
Thanksgiving week, both before and after the big day, is also a huge one for college basketball, as many of the top teams take the opportunity to play marquee matchups in early-season tournaments. Sportsbooks say it is one of the biggest weeks for college basketball handle outside of March Madness.
"We always kind of call it the unofficial kickoff of the college basketball season," Cipollini said. "College basketball fans, it's a huge week for them, the first big one. And I feel like it does slow a little bit in December and then really pick up back in January."
Among the many factors driving action during the week is the fact that these sports play in unorthodox time slots, combined with the fact that many bettors are off from work Thursday and Friday before hanging out with friends and family over the weekend.
"On a typical fall week, most games kick off around 7 p.m. Eastern (4 p.m. Pacific) on Monday through Friday. During Thanksgiving week, the landscape changes dramatically with college basketball games tipping off nearly every hour from morning through night, while football adds three stand-alone NFL games in prime-time slots," Feazel said. "On top of that, college football spreads its rivalry matchups across two days, further fueling engagement and betting action."
Additionally, the NHL will have 30 teams in action on Wednesday and Friday, while the NBA will feature several marquee matchups throughout the long weekend, including Minnesota Timberwolves-Oklahoma City Thunder, Houston Rockets-Golden State Warriors and Dallas Mavericks-Los Angeles Lakers.
"If you are a huge NBA fan or a huge hockey fan, it ends up being a great slate, a ton of matchups. Thanksgiving eve actually always ends up being a pretty big handle day for us," Cipollini said. "I wouldn't be surprised if that Friday is also a very huge bet-on day."
And if that all weren't enough, Major League Soccer will decide the finalists for the MLS Cup on Saturday when Inter Miami takes on NYCFC and San Diego FC battles the Vancouver Whitecaps.
It all serves as an appetizer for the coming months when football starts to get more serious, and basketball and hockey really get into their rhythm.
"The next 40 days is going to be just an incredible time where we're going to have supreme action," Avello said. "We'll be working hard and the consumer will be resting and enjoying it."
