‘Lottery Fever’ Grips IL As Mega Millions Jackpot Soars To $1.1B

ILLINOIS — The jackpot in Tuesday’s Mega Millions drawing has soared to $1.1 billion in a bout of “lottery fever” that has swept Illinois and the rest of the country.

The Powerball jackpot climbed to $865 million in Wednesday’s drawing after no one matched the winning six numbers in Monday’s drawing — the white balls 7, 11, 19, 53, 68 and the red Powerball of 23.

The $1.1 billion Mega Millions jackpot, the fifth largest in the history of the game, grew after no one in Friday’s drawing matched all six numbers drawn — the white balls 3, 8, 31, 35 and 44, plus the gold Mega Ball, 16. Drawings are held twice a week, at 11 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesdays and Fridays.

The cash payout for Tuesday’s jackpot currently stands at $525.8 million. Most people take the cash option with federal taxes taken off the top, though jackpot prizes can be spread over 30 years.

Illinois residents who want to get in on the action need to acquire their tickets by 9:45 p.m.

“Lottery fever continues to spread throughout the country,” Georgia Lottery president and CEO Gretchen Corbin, the lead director of the Mega Millions Consortium, said in a news release. “Large jackpots provide entertainment and winnings for our players while contributing to the beneficiary programs funded by each lottery.”

Mega Millions is the only lottery game that has ventured into billion-dollar-territory six times.

Illinois players have had some good luck playing Mega Millions. Jackpots claimed in the state since 2002 include:

• A $12 million jackpot won by a Chicago woman in 2002
• $28 million won in Chatham, Illinois, in 2002.
• $17 million won by a player from Franklin Grove in 2008
• $20 million won by a Hennepin, Illinois couple in 2010
• A $656 million jackpot won by an Illinois couple from Red Bud in 2012
• $265 million won by a Naperville man in 2015
• $262 million won by two Blue Island men in 2015
• $134 million won in Tuscola, Illinois in 2016
• A $393 million jackpot won by a Palos Heights woman in 2017
• $1.337 billion jackpot won by an anonymous player in Des Plaines in 2022

Mega Millions is played in 45 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Tickets cost $2. In most states, players can add the Megaplier option for $1. Overall, there were 2,564,114 winning tickets across all prize tiers in Friday’s drawing.

Six tickets matched the five white balls to win the second-tier prize of $1 million. The players included one in Virginia who bought the Megaplier option, which was 3X, yielding a $3 million prize. The other $1 million tickets were sold in California, Florida, Illinois, Nebraska and Texas.

Eighty tickets matched four white balls and the Mega Ball to win third-tier prizes worth $10,000. Twelve of those prizes are worth $30,000 because the player purchased the Multiplier option.

The Mega Millions jackpot was last won on Dec. 8 with two tickets sold in California. Since then, more than 26.2 million winning tickets have been sold across all prize tiers. These include second-tier prizes of $1 million — or more if the player bought the Megaplier option — sold in 20 states: Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia.

Mega Millions said five jackpot prizes worth $1 billion or more have gone to players in South Carolina (2018), Michigan (2021), Illinois (2022), and Maine and Florida (2023). The Florida prize of $1.602 billion was the largest jackpot in the history of the game.

Lottery officials reminded players to play responsibly. The overall odds of winning any Mega Millions prize are 1 in 24; the odds of winning the jackpot are 1 in 302,575,350.