Of 30 big wins this week, one story about more than luck

Remember the woman from Mecklenburg County who is battling breast cancer and won the $1 million prize in the first Ultimate Millions second-chance drawing? She fell to the floor in excitement when she found out she won.

Short said winning the prize meant a lot to her because of her cancer diagnosis six years ago. “I have a second chance,” she said at the time. “That’s what my whole life is about, second chances.”

Now she's won a big lottery prize for a second time. Three months after that win, Short's All or Nothing ticket matched none of the numbers in the April 29 evening drawing to win the game's $250,000 top prize. “It’s not something you can put into words,” Gina’s husband Len said. “For us to have the good fortune of winning not just one big prize but two, we are just very thankful for that.”

Short's story has traveled far beyond North Carolina, with the news of her second win being shared by news outlets such as CNN, the New York Times and People Magazine.

While her win had by far the biggest impact of the week, it wasn't actually the biggest prize won. That belongs to a Duplin County man who scratched off $1 million. Marshall Britt, who lives in the small southeastern North Carolina town of Albertson, won the prize on a lucky $200 Million Blowout ticket.

Clear across the state in Macon County, west of Asheville, Jeffery Bianchi of Franklin is a $314,499 Cash 5 jackpot winner. He says he'll use the prize money he won in the April 23 drawing to buy a new Harley-Davidson.

Two hundred miles away in the northwestern corner of the state, a couple in Surry County says they're going to buy a retirement home with the $150,000 they won on a Casino Riches ticket. Shawn and Laurel Wittke of Elkin bought the lucky ticket at the Market Basked on N.C. 268 in Wilkesboro.

Two players won $50,000 instantly:

- Prawinbhai Pancholi of Charlotte (50X The Cash)
- Eric Goodman of Tar Heel (10th Anniversary Millions)

Two more collected $50,000 prizes they won playing Powerball:

- Garry Furr of Kannapolis (Jan. 13 drawing)
- Larking Nelson of Henderson (May 4 drawing)

Heading into Saturday's Powerball drawing, the jackpot annuity is $415 million, worth $269.7 million cash. We'll be looking forward to seeing if we have any big-winning tickets in the drawing - maybe even the big one!

Continuing with this week's biggest wins, Virginia Menegigian of Matthews played a "Did I Win?" ticket - and the answer was yes, to the tune of $30,000. Six more players scratched their way to $10,000:

- Charlene Stone of Burlington ($200 Million Blowout)
- Jason Dayberry of Shelby (Millionaire 7's)
- Roney Ross of Hope Mills (Millionaire Bucks)
- David Dorsett of Asheboro (50X The Cash)
- Brenda Labarge of Raleigh (10th Anniversary Millions)
- Loren Dunn of Raeford ($250,000 Fortune)

Tiffany Freeman of Asheboro won the top prize of $7,000 on a $1 Lucky 7's ticket.

Get this: We had 14 prizes of $5,000 claimed this week, including one shared by six players from Montgomery and Randolph Counties. And two of the winners are from Charlotte. The other 11 are from: Asheboro, Cary, Graham, Grimesland, Marion, Murphy, Raeford, Raleigh, Rockingham, Salisbury, and Whiteville.

That's 30 wins of $5,000 to $1 million this week, which helped push the total for the week to more than $29 million!

Thanks for reading and thanks for playing. We hope everyone has a fun and safe Mother's Day weekend. See you soon here in the Lucke-Zone.