Largest Powerball jackpot of the year

by Todd Northrop

The multi-state Powerball lottery drawing happened last night once again without any jackpot winners, causing the new jackpot for Wednesday's drawing to grow to an estimated $260 million, with a cash option of $134.2 million.

Saturday night was the 11th consecutive drawing without a jackpot winner.

Even though there were no jackpot winners, 11 lucky tickets matched the first five numbers for a $200,000 second-place prize: 1 from Florida, 1 from Illinois, 1 from New Jersey, 1 from New Mexico, 2 from New York, 1 from Ohio, 3 from Pennsylvania, and 1 from Wisconsin.

Two of the second-prize tickets, the ticket sold in Florida and one of the tickets sold in New York, were purchased with the Power Play option, which has multiplied the ticket-holders' prizes to a sizable $1 million.

75 tickets matched four white numbers plus the Powerball and won $10,000. Of those tickets, 14 also were purchased with the Power Play option, multiplying the prize by 4 for a total cash prize of $40,000.

The Powerball winning numbers for Saturday, May 29, were 1, 3, 24, 28, and 41, with Powerball number 10. The Power Play number was 4.

Only four jackpots in the past three years have been larger than the upcoming Wednesday drawing.

• On August 19, 2009, a retired South Carolina state employee who spent two bucks on tickets won a $260 million Powerball jackpot.
• The May 27 jackpot, worth $232 million in yearly payments, was hit by a 23-year-old South Dakota rancher who opted for the lump sum. The check was for $88,504,147 after taxes were withheld.
• The March 15, 2008, prize reached $276 million before being snagged by eight coworkers in a West Virginia tax office.
• On Aug. 25, 2007, one of the biggest Powerball prizes ever, $314 million, was hit in Indiana. An Ohio man and his two children collected.

In the Powerball drawing last night, a total of 1,542,606 tickets across the USA won $15,085,297 in prizes playing "America's Game". 262,507 of those winning tickets were purchased with the Power Play option, which multiplied the prize by 4 Saturday.

When a Powerball ticket is purchased with the Power Play option for an extra $1 per ticket, any non-jackpot prize is multiplied from 2-5 times, depending on a computerized random number generated that evening. Second-place Power Play-enabled tickets matching five numbers but not the Powerball are always multiplied by 5 times, for a $1 million prize.

In the month of May 2010, a special 10x promotion was held, which replaced on of the 5x multipliers with a 10x selection.  Because the Power Play 10x promotion was not won in the month of May, it will continue next drawing and each drawing thereafter until the 10x multiplier is drawn.

The lotteries sold $2.56 billion in Powerball tickets in fiscal year 2009, translating into over $743 million for state projects.

Powerball is now played in 42 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Drawings are Wednesdays and Saturdays at 11:00 p.m. Eastern Time.