Nobody won the biggest jackpot in Powerball history — a whopping $949.8 million.
Officials at the Texas Lottery tweeted the bad news for the millions of players at around 1:30 a.m. Sunday.
The jackpot is now expected to soar to a stratospheric $1.3 billion for Wednesday’s drawing. That would be a world record, the tweet added.
Meanwhile, one of the many players who missed out on the big win got a nice consolation prize.
The lottery player on Staten Island won a paltry $165 million Friday night in the Mega Millions drawing.
The single winning ticket — a Quick Pick — was sold at Willowbrook Deli at 2520 Victory Blvd. The winner who pulled the 11, 39, 51, 57 and 75, plus the Mega Ball 2, wasn’t identified.
But the measly Mega Millions prize — with a cash value of $101 million — only fueled the city’s Powerball fever.
Will Ortiz, 47, walked into the lucky Willowbrook Deli on Saturday and rubbed the door frame like a magic lamp. He bought two Powerball tickets, telling clerk Manny Gonzalez, “Tell the [Mega Millions] winner their cousin is here waiting for him.”
Brisk Powerball sales in 44 states, Washington, DC, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands prompted lottery officials to add $100 million to the pot Saturday, building on what was already the biggest jackpot ever.
In Brooklyn, a stream of customers waited inside the 72 Lucky Lotto deli in Bay Ridge as if it were Times Square on New Year’s Eve, praying for their Powerballs to drop, the 1-in-292-million odds be damned. “Yesterday we had more than 1,000 customers buying Powerball tickets,” said manager Arshad Ali.
Iris Badalamenti, 39, was part of a pool with 24 co-workers.
“We said we’d all go away together, which means no one would show up at work,” she said.
“A girl can dream.”
The Powerball jackpot has been growing since Nov. 4, when it was $40 million. It’s the kind of exponential growth lottery officials hoped for last fall when they made it harder to win by increasing the number of white balls from 59 to 69, while decreasing the number of red Powerballs from 35 to 26. A $2 ticket gives you one chance to win.