Patricia Forrest and her husband, Barry, are the first to win $100,000 playing the lottery’s newest draw game, Keno.

“It feels different playing Keno,” Patricia said. “You find out right away that you won. It’s just fun to play.”

The couple’s good luck happened when Barry stopped by Grocery Boy Jr. on Lake Wheeler Road in Raleigh and bought tickets for twenty drawings on June 28. One of those tickets matched 10 numbers in a 10 spot game winning the top prize of $100,000.

“I realized I won later that afternoon,” Barry said. “It was exciting! It took two days for it to feel real.”

That’s when he told his wife.

“I was thrilled to death when he told me,” Patricia said.

They claimed the prize Thursday at lottery headquarters in Raleigh. After required state and federal tax withholdings, they took home $70,505. They plan to spend the money on their family.

“We have four grandkids,” Patricia said. “So that should tell you where it’s going.”

Keno launched in October. The game offers chances to win prizes in drawings every five minutes. Players choose how many numbers, or spots, they want to try and match. The number of spots they play and match determines how much they win. For each drawing, 20 numbers out of 80 possible are selected as winning numbers. The approximate odds of winning a $100,000 prize are 1 in 8.91 million.

Ticket sales from draw games like Keno make it possible for the lottery to raise more than $600 million dollars a year for education. For details on how over $57 million raised by the lottery supported education programs in Wake County last year, click on the “Impact” section of the lottery’s website, https://www.nclottery.com.