Powerball Lottery Has Host of Runner-Up Prizes for Grabs
— -- There were no Powerball winners this weekend, but there were 18,315,365 other winners, officials said.
All eyes are predictably on the jackpot, but there are other prizes available that have significantly easier odds than Powerball’s one in 292 million.
What Prizes Are Up for Grabs
The grand prize is obviously the jackpot, where a particularly lucky person has all five of the numbers from the white balls -- in any order -- as well as the red Powerball.
The jackpot is now $1.5 billion and could grow larger before tonight's drawing if more people buy tickets.
From there, the second-place prize is for those who get all five of the numbers on the white balls but just don't get the final Powerball number. Such a drawing leads to $1 million in winnings.
The odds of winning $1 million are one in 11,688,053.52.
From there, you can win $50,000 if you have four white numbers and the Powerball, which lottery organizers report happens in one out of 913,129.18 cases.
If you get either four white balls and no Powerball or three white balls and the Powerball, you win $100.
With three white balls and no Powerball or two white balls and the Powerball, you win $7.
The final prize comes if you have one white ball and the Powerball or just the Powerball itself, which wins you $4. That's the equivalent of two Powerball tickets.
How Can You Double Your Winnings
Some players choose to up the ante on their potential winnings by purchasing the Power Play option for an extra dollar when they are buying their tickets.
What happens with the Power Play is that spending $3 per ticket, rather than $2, ensures the buyer will have his or her prize money -- whatever it is – doubled, except in the case of the jackpot.
How Many People Won This Weekend
There were clearly no jackpot winners, but there were plenty of people who, at least, took some winnings home.
All told, lottery organizers announced on their website that there were people who won money in every participating state, and there were 28 people who had all five white ball numbers. Of those, 25 people took home $1 million and three had chosen the Power Play option, so they won $2 million.
There were 451 others who had four white balls and the Powerball, with 396 people taking home $50,000 and 55 people who won $100,000 because of Power Play.
In total, $159,080,965 in prize money was handed out this weekend after Saturday night's drawing.
