North Carolinians Help Lottery Get off to Good Start
By Crystal Calloway

Almost $1.5 million in prizes, $10 million dollars in sales, and more than $2 million raised for education – that's how the North Carolina Education Lottery did in its first day.

North Carolina is the 42nd state to have a lottery and in its first week, it's already catching up to other states, with more than 500 stores selling tickets.

For $1 you can play the classic game of Tic Tac Toe, or another game with the same name as the lottery.

Two dollars will get you playing Blackjack, and $5 will buy you a ticket to play the $100,000 Carolina Cash game.

Four scratch-off games debuted Thursday when North Carolina finally got its lottery.

So far, Walter Young has been the biggest winner at the Key Food Mart on West Rosemary Street. He took home $100 on his very first ticket, and hopes others will be as lucky.

"And you hopefully get a winning number, but if your winning number doesn't come up, you can always try again,” Young said.

That's just what lottery officials are hoping customers will do. To keep people playing, they've made it so most will at least win a small prize.

Tic Tac Toe is the most popular game and the easiest to play. You have an eight-to-one chance of winning back the cost of the ticket and a one in more than 2 million chance of winning the $5,000 prize.

The odds of winning the smallest prize – a free ticket – for the Carolina Cash game are also eight-to-one. But the chance of winning the biggest prize of any of the scratch-off games -- $100,000 – is one in almost 2.2 million.

So why play with such small odds?

"Of course you win money, of course. But you're also helping a lot of people get scholarships and things,” Young said.