A Powerball winner who purchased their ticket in Lake Elsinore narrowly missed the grand prize of $437 million in Saturday’s drawing. Still, they’ll walk away with a quarter of a million dollars.
The ticket was the only one in California to hit the five main numbers, not including the Powerball. The numbers were 7, 16, 19, 45 and 64. The Powerball number was 25.
The ticket was sold at a Chevron gas station on Railroad Canyon Road in Lake Elsinore, and the exact prize amount was $243,665.
Just one other individual also matched five numbers not including the Powerball. The ticket was bought in Pennsylvania. The game is played in 45 states, as well as Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Those two individuals have 180 days to claim their prize.
The grand prize will rise to $456 million for Monday’s drawing, with a cash payout of $219.9 million.
Each of the winners purchased their ticket for 2 bucks, and the odds of winning the big prize are exceedingly slim: 1 in 292.2 million.
The folks behind the lottery say they’re going to be improving those astronomical odds — on one game, at least. Beginning in April, Mega Millions tickets will take a leap from $2 a ticket to $5. The director of the Mega Millions Consortium recently told The Times that the adjusted odds of winning Mega Millions will now be better than those for winning Powerball.
The odds of winning Mega Millions are currently 1 in 302.6 million. For Powerball, they’re 1 in 292.2 million.
In addition, Mega Millions will add a built-in multiplier to every ticket, automatically improving non-jackpot wins by as much as 10 times. And, the game will eliminate break-even tickets, meaning that when a player wins, they’ll always win more than the cost of the ticket.
