If you passionately believe that Georgetown’s going to go all the way in this year’s March Madness, you can now legally put some money on it — but it will take a trip across the Key Bridge to get it done.

Of the 24 states have legalized sports betting in recent years, D.C. and Virginia are among the handful that have imposed a very specific prohibition on it when it comes to college sports — there’s absolutely no betting on any in-state schools if you’re using any of the legal wagering apps or brick-and-mortar sportsbooks.

And that could well prove an unexpected inconvenience in the area, where D.C. and Virginia have a combined five teams in the men’s tournament — Georgetown, Virginia, Liberty, Norfolk State, and VCU. (Virginia Tech lost to Florida earlier this afternoon.)

In D.C., true blue-blooded Hoyas fans will have to cross into Virginia to legally bet on their team, just as a Fairfax County resident who thinks that Norfolk State will upend everyone’s expectations will have to travel into D.C. to put some money on it. (Sports betting apps are geo-located, so where you are standing when you place a bet matters.)

The restrictions stem from a concern among some university officials and elected leaders that while sports betting can bring in loads of revenue for local coffers, it could also serve to corrupt non-professional sports and athletes.

“The monetization of student athletes through legalized sports wagering will expose collegiate athletes and their community of classmates, friends, family, co-workers, and neighbors to the pressures of the gambling industry,” wrote John Cavanaugh, then president of the Consortium of Universities of the Washington Metropolitan Area, to D.C. Lottery officials in 2019 as they were developing the rules for sports betting in the city.

Virginia followed suit when it crafted its own sports betting program, which launched earlier this year. In Maryland, voters approved sports betting in a Nov. 2020 referendum, and a bill implementing the program cleared the House of Delegates earlier this month — without a specific prohibition on betting on in-state colleges and universities.

For some D.C. sports fans, there’s an additional challenge: there’s only one brick-and-mortar sportsbook currently operating in town — William Hill at Capital One Arena — and only one app that works citywide, GambetDC, which was developed by the D.C. Lottery. (It launched last year to mixed reactions; it currently only 1.5 out of 5 stars in Apple’s App Store.)

Virginia officials, on the other hand, decided to allow a number of private sports betting apps to operate, including FanDuel, DraftKings, BetMGM, and WynnBet. Maryland is likely to follow suit.