On Friday night, the Mega Millions lottery awarded its estimated $1.35 billion grand prize to a lucky ticket holder in Maine, marking the state’s first Mega Millions jackpot win. The winning combination of numbers drawn were 30, 43, 45, 46, 61 and the gold Mega Ball 14, defying the odds of 1 in 302.6 million and ending a three-month dry spell without a claim on the jackpot.
“Congratulations to the Maine State Lottery, which has just won its first-ever Mega Millions jackpot,” said Pat McDonald, Ohio lottery director and lead director of the Mega Millions Consortium in a statement on Saturday.
This jackpot was the second largest in Mega Millions history and the fourth time the game has had a billion-dollar win, the largest being $1.53 billion claimed by a single ticket holder in South Carolina in October 2018.
Friday’s drawing also marked the seventh time that a grand prize winner was selected on Friday the 13th, a date that is traditionally considered unlucky. The winner can choose to take the full amount of $1.35 billion in an annuity with annual payments over 29 years or the cash option of $724.6 million. The next grand prize drawing will be on Tuesday with an estimated $20 million and a cash option of $10.7 million.
There were more than 7 million winning tickets across nine prize tiers on Friday. In addition to the jackpot win in Maine, 14 tickets matched five white balls to claim the second-tier prize of $1 million. These tickets were sold in states such as New York, California, Florida, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Texas. Mega Millions is played in 45 states, Washington D.C. and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
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