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                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, February 14, 1992                   TAG: 9202140368
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NEWPORT NEWS                                LENGTH: Short

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MAN BUYS 50,000 LOTTO TICKETS

An unidentified Lotto player had just the numbers Thursday for this weekend's $22 million drawing.

The man walked into a convenience store and bought $50,000 worth of tickets.

Miller Mart manager Chuck Ragland said it will take 20 to 25 hours to fill the order for the 50,000 picks in Saturday's drawing.

"He said, `Here's my tickets, run them,' " Ragland said. "Just like any other customer, except he had a few more tickets." Ragland said he had no idea who the man was.

Players are asked to mark their six numbers on a computer scorecard that can hold up to five sets of six numbers.

Ragland began running the picks through the lottery card computer Thursday morning. By midafternoon he had run about 5,000 picks through the computer. The player's cards were all filled out by hand. With five plays per card, it took at least 10,000 cards to select 50,000 combinations.

Ragland said the ticket buyer was about 30 years old. "I've never seen him before," he said. "He just seemed like the normal guy who comes in and buys one ticket."

Even individual ticket has a 1-in-7.1 million chance of winning. Buying 50,000 tickets carries about a 1-in-142 chance - less than 1 percent - of hitting the jackpot, according to state Lottery officials. The numbers in Wednesday's $15.9 million prize drawing were 13, 20, 26, 28, 30 and 38.

Spokeswoman Paula Otto said 118 tickets matched five numbers to win $1,670; 6,707 matched four to win $62; and 115,132 matched three for a free play.

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