Pennsylvania lottery to add day drawings

HARRISBURG (AP) -- People hoping to cash in on two of Pennsylvania's most popular lottery games -- The Daily Number and Big 4 -- will soon have twice as many opportunities.
Starting Tuesday, the Pennsylvania State Lottery will add drawings for both games at 1:35 p.m., seven days a week, in addition to the drawings at 7 p.m.
The new games are expected to generate $50 million a year in new sales, though even those involved in the lottery business predict that the new midday drawings will take time to catch on.
Fifteen other states, i ncluding Ohio, have midday lottery drawings, according to Pennsylvania lottery officials.
Tickets for the midday drawings will be sold along with those for the evening drawings. They will be marked "Nite" or "Day" to reflect which drawing they are for.
The midday drawings will not be televised, but an animation revealing the numbers will be posted on the lottery's Web site and the winning numbers will be announced during the televised evening drawings, a lottery official said.
While lottery sales have surged in recent years, most of the increase came from instant-ticket games and the introduction of the Powerball interstate lottery in Pennsylvania. Sales of The Daily Number tickets have slumped, meanwhile, from $556 million in 1997-98 to $492 million last year, officials said.