The Mega Millions jackpot will reach $121 million for next Tuesday’s drawing after the numbers that came up Friday night failed to match any ticket for the 10th consecutive drawing, leaving players wondering if the national lottery game with its 259 million to one odds could be headed for another stratospheric jackpot.
The Mega Millions jackpot hit $400 million on March 18 after going without a winner since the previous December 17. That year-ending jackpot was even bigger. In fact, at $648 million, that jackpot was the second largest Mega Millions jackpot ever — which made it also the second-largest prize in U.S. lottery history.
Before that, the previous Mega Millions winner came on October 1 of 2013.
The swelling Mega Millions jackpot is also creating a rising number of ticket sales. Friday night’s drawing, with a $105 million jackpot at stake, generated more than 24.5 million sales, the highest total since the $400 million March 18 drawing.
The sales total was also the highest for any jackpot under $125 million since September 19, 2013, when a $119 million Mega Millions jackpot was good for about 26.2 million ticket sales.
Though there was no Mega Millions jackpot winner on Friday, three tickets matched the first five numbers , but not the Mega Ball. One of those tickets, sold in Georgia, brought its lucky holder a cool $1 million.
But the other two tickets were purchased in California, where all Mega Millions prizes except the top jackpot are paid on a pari-mutuel basis. That is, prizes are determined by the number of tickets sold in the state and in effect, lottery ticker buyers are competing against each other.
The two “Match 5” ticket s sold in California on Friday will each be good for a prize of $468,905.
All told, 1,590,904 tickets, or 6.4 percent of all Mega Millions tickets sold, won at least the minimum $1 prize — in effect, a free ticket, for a total of $4,792,903 in prize money.
Could any of that cash be yours? Check your Mega Millions ticket against these numbers, drawn at 10:59 pm Friday night in Atlanta, Georgia.
10 — 28 — 39 — 51 — 59 Mega Ball 14
The cash value of the Tuesday jackpot is $69.2 million for a winner who takes the prize in a single cash payment.
