Lottery officials said in a statement that the challenging year 2020 has been lucky for New Jersey Mega Millions players – for the second time this year, a jackpot was won in the Garden State.
According to the statement, officials said the single ticket matched all six numbers drawn Friday night – the white balls 8, 33, 39, 54 and 58, plus the gold Mega Ball 17.
The lucky ticket-holder wins the estimated $124 million jackpot ($100.8 million cash).
Officials say on February 11, another New Jersey ticket took a $202 million prize.
The July 24 drawing also produced two winners of the game’s $1 million second prize, with tickets in Illinois and Texas matching the five white balls.
Sixteen tickets won the $10,000 third prize; two of those included the optional Megaplier (available as an extra purchase in most states), so they are actually worth $30,000 after the 3X Megaplier was drawn.
In total, there were 479,470 winning tickets sold for Friday night’s drawing at all prize levels, excluding the jackpot winner.
During this jackpot run that began with the June 12 drawing, there were almost 5.9 million winning tickets sold, including 13 second-tier prizes of $1 million or more.
In addition to the two New Jersey jackpot winners this year, a third jackpot was won in Arizona – that state’s first – on June 9. A player choosing to remain anonymous claimed that $414 million prize.
The jackpot for the next drawing on Tuesday, July 28, resets to its current starting value of $20 million ($16.2 million cash).