In the 38 Powerball draws since Aug. 3, there hasn’t been a jackpot winner.
WASHINGTON — If no one wins Wednesday night’s drawing, the Powerball jackpot could become the largest prize in the lottery game’s history.
The winning numbers for Wednesday’s drawing were 2-11-22-35-60, Powerball 23 and Power Play 2.
The prize climbed to $1.2 billion, the fourth-largest jackpot in the U.S., after no one matched all six numbers for Monday’s Halloween drawing. In the 38 draws since Aug. 3, there hasn’t been a jackpot winner.
The Multi-State Lottery Association, which oversees the Powerball game, reported 131.6 million Powerball tickets sold for Monday’s drawing. As a result, 36.3% of all possible number combinations were covered, with millions of players picking the same ones.
With a jackpot odds of 1 in 292.2 million, that means about 186 million number combinations weren’t covered, explaining why no one won the grand prize on Monday.
The winner would have the option for an annuity payment, doled out over 29 years. Nearly all winners choose a cash prize, which would be $596.7 million.
Over the past few years, huge lottery jackpots have become more common as lottery officials have changed the rules and ticket prices to boost top prizes. The latest change came in August, when Powerball officials added a third drawing day to the weekly schedule to pump prizes and sales.
The biggest prize was a $1.586 billion Powerball jackpot won by three ticketholders in 2016. Once a winning ticket matches the drawing, the Powerball jackpot starts over again at $20 million and continues to grow each drawing until it is won.
Powerball is played in 45 states, as well as Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
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The Associated Press contributed to this report.