For just the third time in history, one of America’s national jackpot games is nearing the $1 billion mark.
Tuesday night’s Mega Millions drawing again produced millions of winning tickets, but not one that matched all six numbers – the white balls 10, 19, 26, 28 and 50, plus the gold Mega Ball 16.
As a result, Friday’s jackpot will be an estimated $970 million ($716.3 million cash), the second-largest prize in the game’s history.
Tonight’s drawing will be the 37th draw in the current jackpot run, which began after a Wisconsin player won a $120 million prize on Sept. 15.
If the Mega Millions jackpot is won this Friday, it would be the third largest lotto prize ever, below only two jackpots exceeding $1.5 billion – the world record Powerball jackpot of $1.586 billion (Jan. 13, 2016) and the current Mega Millions record of $1.537 billion (Oct. 23, 2018).
The latter prize is the world’s largest won on a single ticket, as the record Powerball jackpot was shared by three winning tickets.