BALTIMORE – She’s been playing the Maryland Lottery for years because, as she puts it, “it’s just exciting.” But winning big is even more exciting, and now that’s something she’s done twice.
Most recently, Hyattsville resident “Cheryl” collected a $100,000 prize on the scratch-off game $5,000,000 Fortune. As she visited the Winner’s Circle at Lottery headquarters in Baltimore on April 8, she took a few minutes to talk about her Lottery adventures, which also include a $50,000 win in 2012.
Cheryl landed her $100,000 prize when she stopped at Town Center Market at 4705 Queensbury Road in Riverdale to buy Lottery tickets before heading off to a bingo game at a nearby firehall. During a break in play, she decided to scratch her Lottery tickets and that’s when she realized that she’d won quite a bit more than a bingo prize.
Her first big win of $50,000 came in August of 2012, when she landed a top prize on the daily drawing game Bonus Match 5.
With her most recent prize, she plans to make some home renovations, take a nice trip to an as yet undetermined location and settle up some bills.
Though Cheryl’s prize was substantial, the $5,000,000 Fortune ticket has a top prize of $5 million. When the $50 game started in February 2025, it had three such top prizes, but two of those have been claimed as of April 9. The game started with nine prizes at the second-tier $100,000 level, of which three remain unclaimed after Cheryl’s big win. There are also four unclaimed $50,000 prizes, 41 $10,000 prizes and thousands of additional prizes ranging from $50 to $5,000.