Lucky winner buys ticket at Howard County 7-11
A 37-year-old Texas man, here in Maryland on business, told Lottery officials today that he doesn’t know what to think about winning a $1 million second-tier prize in Saturday’s Powerball drawing. He’s just happy and still a little shocked.
Cody Kent, an industrial mechanic working in Ellicott City for the past month, said he bought four Powerball tickets on a whim on Saturday, opting to let the Lottery terminal Quick Pick his numbers.
“After work, my buddy suggested we get some tickets, so we did,” he said.
He pocketed the tickets and headed back to his temporary home and took it easy on Saturday, not even watching the Powerball drawing.
Kent didn’t check his tickets until Sunday, and at first he was a bit confused as to what he saw.
“I thought the internet was showing my numbers back to me,” he said with a laugh. “I thought, ‘how does the computer know my numbers?’”
A couple of minutes later, it started to sink in that he was looking at the winning numbers and that the numbers on his ticket matched. A friend who was with him at the time also confirmed the win. Still shaken up about the news, Kent said he went to a local pub to watch his favorite teams, the Houston Rockets and the Houston Astros, and to try to calm down. In addition to his Lottery win, both of Kent’s teams also won.
“This has been an awesome weekend,” he said.
On Monday afternoon, as he arrived at Maryland Lottery headquarters to claim his prize, he was still having a hard time processing his good fortune. Kent said he is not sure what he will do with the prize money, but told Lottery officials he will probably set up a savings account for his retirement.
The winning ticket was purchased at the 7-11 store located at 6590-B Old Waterloo Road in Elkridge. The store will receive a $2,500 bonus for selling the winning ticket, which was one of four $1 million winners sold nationally for Saturday’s drawing. The other three were sold in Iowa, Pennsylvania and Texas. But nobody hit the Powerball jackpot, which now rolls to $121 million with a cash option of 75.7 million for the next drawing on Wednesday night.
 Texas resident Cody Kent, here in Maryland on business, won $1 million in Saturday’s Powerball drawing. |