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Strong ticket sales precede Thursday's inaugural drawing
The New York Lottery today announced the debut of its new Lotto spin-off game, Sweet Million, offering players a twice weekly chance to win up to $1,000,000 in cash. The Lottery reports strong player interest in the game as measured by initial sales.
"This isn't your typical Lotto game where a single person can win a large jackpot," said New York Lottery Director Gordon Medenica. "Instead, with Sweet Million, multiple players can each win $1,000,000. The new prize structure addresses our players' frequent request for a jackpot-type game with better odds," continued Medenica. "The odds of winning a $1,000,000 prize in the Sweet Million drawing are 1 in 3.9 million, making it your best chance to win $1,000,000 for just $1."
Tickets for the Sweet Million game went on sale Tuesday, September 15, 2009. Sales for Thursday's inaugural drawing total more than $400,000 after just one full day of sales.
The premier drawing will take place Thursday, September 17th. In a first for the New York Lottery, drawings for the Sweet Million game will be broadcast exclusively on the Internet at www.sweetmillion.com, which can also be accessed from the Lottery's main website, www.nylottery.org. Subsequent drawings will take place every Monday and Thursday at approximately 9:30 p.m. and will be available online for viewing within minutes of the official drawing. Like all televised New York Lottery drawings, the Sweet Million drawing will be conducted under the observation of an auditor from KPMG to ensure the integrity of the process.
To win the $1,000,000 top prize, players must match six winning numbers drawn from a field of 40. In the event there are more than five top prize winners in a single game, the winners will receive an equal share of the total $5,000,000 top prize monies available for that drawing. Other prize levels for the game include: match five of six numbers, win $500; match four of the six numbers; win $40; and match three of six winning numbers, win $3.
Winning numbers for the Sweet Million drawing will be available at www.nylottery.org and will be posted at more than 16,000 New York Lottery retail locations statewide. Players may also retrieve the winning numbers for all New York Lottery games by calling, toll-free, 1-800-342-3666.
The New York Lottery continues to be North America's largest and most profitable Lottery, earning more than $36.7 billion in education support statewide since its founding over 40 years ago. The Lottery contributed nearly $2.54 billion in fiscal year 2008-9 to help support education in New York State, which was over 12 percent of total state education funding to local school districts. The Lottery's ongoing commitment to education also includes the awarding of more than 1,100 Leaders of Tomorrow (LOT) Scholarships annually to high school students pursuing their higher education in New York State. Since 1999, the Lottery has awarded more than 11,500 scholarships representing a total commitment of almost $50 million. |
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