Adriene Wynn of Greensboro decided to try her luck on a Mega Millions ticket “out of the blue” and surprised herself when she won a $1 million prize.
“I said, ‘I know this can’t be real!’” she recalled of learning of her big win. Wynn purchased her winning Quick Pick ticket from the Kwik JP Express on Randleman Road in Greensboro.
“I woke up in the middle of the night and I just thought, ‘Let me call and check the tickets,’” she said.
So, she called the lottery’s customer service hotline to check her Mega Millions numbers.
“I called about five times to make sure I wasn’t dreaming or something,” Wynn recalled, laughing. “When they kept saying the same thing, I kept saying, ‘Oh my God, oh my God!’”
Her $2 ticket matched the numbers on all five white balls and was one of two tickets that won the highest prize nationally in Tuesday’s drawing. The odds of matching all five white balls in a Mega Millions drawing are 1 in 12.6 million.
“After I found out that it was real, I was jumping up and down on my bed like it was a trampoline,” said Wynn. “If I could have done a cartwheel without breaking anything I would have.”
Wynn claimed her prize Wednesday at lottery headquarters in Raleigh and took home $707,501 after required federal and state tax withholdings.
With her prize money, Wynn plans to pay off bills, buy her family a new home, and invest the rest.
No one won Tuesday’s Mega Millions jackpot. The jackpot stands at $168 million as an annuity or $112.1 million cash for Friday’s drawing. The odds of winning a Mega Millions jackpot are 1 in 302 million.
Players can buy Mega Millions tickets through Online Play on the lottery’s website, www.nclottery.com, with the NC Lottery Official Mobile App, or at any lottery retail location.
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