Second-Largest Powerball Winner Revealed, Current Jackpots Keep Ballooning

Five months after the second-largest U.S. lottery jackpot ever was hit, California Lottery officials have revealed the name of the winner — or at least one of the winners.

Last Oct. 11, a ticket sold at Midway Market & Liquor in the small California mountain town of Frazier Park hit the $1.765 billion Powerball jackpot, prompting store co-owner Nidal Khalil to declare it “the most exciting news ever [to] happen to Frazier Park.”

On Friday, lottery officials went public with the winner: Theodorus Struyck, a 65-year-old grandfather who lives just about five football-field lengths away from the Midway Market (which received a prize of $1 million for selling the lucky ticket)

The money isn’t all Struyck’s, however. He represents a group of winners who went in on the ticket together. Further details of the size of the group and the shares of the winnings were kept private.

“Announcing big wins like this gives all of our players the chance to hope and dream that they could be next,” California Lottery Director Harjinder K. Shergill Chima said in a press release. “But it also gives us an opportunity to shine the spotlight on our terrific mission, which is to generate additional, supplemental funding for public education in California. So, it’s students of all ages across the state who win every day thanks to our players, our retail partners who sell these fun games, and our hard-working staff here at the Lottery. This is an exciting day for all of us!” 

Weekend drawing updates

More exciting days are ahead for some lucky Powerball and Mega Millions players. Neither national draw lottery was won over the weekend, swelling both jackpots even higher than the nearly $1.4 billion they’d reached combined last week.

Last Friday’s Mega Millions drawing produced 1,587,100 winners at various non-jackpot levels — including one who won $1 million for matching five white balls, and over a million players who got their $2 back by matching only the gold Mega Ball.

But nobody went a perfect six-for-six, so the jackpot grows from an estimated $815 million for Friday’s drawing to an estimated $875 million for Tuesday’s. The lump-sum cash option is estimated at $413.5 million.

Players could be just a couple more winless drawings away from vying for a jackpot that would cross $1 billion for only the sixth time in Mega Millions history.

Three new Powerball millionaires

The Powerball jackpot is nipping at Mega Millions’ heels, after Saturday’s drawing yielded no grand prize winners chasing an estimated $623 million. There were, however, three million-dollar winners, located in Michigan, New Jersey, and South Carolina.

Another drawing looms Monday night with an estimated jackpot of $645 million and a cash value of $307.3 million.

That means as this new week begins, the Mega Millions and Powerball jackpots sit at a combined $1.52 billion.

Tickets for either Powerball or Mega Millions cost $2, plus a $1 option to play the multiplier. Both lotteries are available in all states except Alabama, Alaska, Hawaii, Nevada, and Utah.