Player buys add-on feature with ticket but may miss out on prize
By Kate Northrop
Someone in Michigan purchased a Fantasy 5 lottery ticket with the Double Play add-on feature, but the $110,000 prize will go by the wayside if they don't step forward in a month to claim it.
Whoever is holding the winning ticket for a $110,000 Fantasy 5 Double Play prize must validate it with the Michigan Lottery in one month or risk losing it all.
A Michigan lottery player purchased a Fantasy 5 ticket at Paramount Foods on Harper Avenue in Harper Woods last year. Whoever did so added the Double Play option to their ticket for an extra dollar and benefited greatly from the choice.
However, they have nothing to gain if they don't present their ticket to the Lottery by 4:45 p.m. EST on May 15, 2026.
The ticket matched all five numbers drawn in the May 15, 2025 Double Play drawing: 3, 10, 18, 22, and 39.
Lottery officials are advising the winner to contact the Player Relations division to schedule an appointment to make the claim. It must be collected at their headquarters in Lansing.
There's still hope yet. In December 2025, an 82-year-old winner claimed a $131,000 Fantasy 5 jackpot just weeks before the winning ticket expired.
If the $110,000 winning ticket expires, the prize money will go to the Michigan School Aid Fund, which serves public school districts across the state.
Players may add the EZmatch feature to their ticket for an additional $1 per play for a chance to win up to $500 or the Double Play feature for a second chance to win up to $110,000 in the nightly Double Play drawing. Players may win prizes in the regular nightly drawing, the Double Play drawing, or both. Fantasy 5 drawings take place every day at 7:29 p.m. Eastern Time.
The winning numbers, jackpot, and prize amounts can be found on Lottery Post's Michigan Lottery Results page right after each drawing.
It is always wild how so many lottery winning tickets are now going unclaimed. I suppose the more hectic life gets the more people buy lottery tickets and forget all about them or where they even put them. I suspect this person's lottery ticket is in the glove box of his/her car, sitting there for months with a bunch of other. Not seeing the light of day until the person decides to clean out their car some time in the Summer
I'll bet you that the lottery suits, will be grinning from cheek to cheek, when that prize goes unclaimed.
They probably threw the winning ticket away.
That "Double Play" technical jargon can be confusing.
I suspect the missing winner was enjoying a wonderful liverwurst or oliveloaf sandwich with wxy and z plus swiss cheese on pumpernickel when he or she completely blanked out that they had bought the ticket.
Have a shaggy day!
ShagE3
Why? Do you think they collect the winnings personally?
It says in the article that unclaimed prizes goes to the public schools.
I think that unclaimed prizes should be returned to the players (a bonus drawing or something). But it's the state, so of course they keep it.
Hope they find the ticket in time.
This Double Play winner from the May 15, 2025, drawing has until 4:45 p.m. EST on May 15, 2026, to claim at Lottery HQ in Lansing with an appointment via 844-887-6836. Plenty of time if they've got the ticket stashed somewhere safe. Lotterologist's spot on about folks tossing them; I've seen it happen with those small-print add-ons confusing players who forget they played the second draw. Unclaimed, it all funnels straight to the School Aid Fund, so either way Michigan wins, but I'd love to hear this one's story if they show up.
I think older people buy them and at some point pass away and know one is thinking of lottery tickets.