The first Lottery ticket this Virginia player ever bought turned into a $50,000 win!

Beginner's luck is real, and this Virginia Lottery player is proof of that!

First-time player and winner

Katelynne Berland was out running errands and had to pick up some lottery tickets for her mom. Since she was buying tickets for her mom, she decided to do something she'd never done before — play the Lottery herself.

Berland decided to try her luck at Virginia Lottery's Pick 5 draw game. She ended up matching the winning five-digit combination of 2-9-4-2-3 in the April 14 Day drawing, which made her a $50,000 winner!

She bought the winning ticket at 7-Eleven, located at 115 Ottis Street in Yorktown. With her winnings, Katelynne said she plans on helping her sister pay for college tuition.

Pick 5 - a quick overview

Pick 5 is a daily draw game held twice daily for the Virginia Lottery. The drawings take place at 1:59 p.m. ET and 11:00 p.m. ET. To play, you need to pick five numbers, each from 0 to 9, or you can choose the Easy Pick option and let the computer generate the numbers for you. Then, you need to choose a play type: Exact Order, Any Order, or 50/50. You can wager $0.50 or $1.

Players can also choose the FIREBALL option, which is an extra ball between 0 and 9. If you add this option, then you can use the FIREBALL number to replace any of the numbers from the main draw in order to make winning matches.

The top prize is $50,000, which is awarded to players who match all five balls in exact order. The game offers seven different prize categories, which vary based on the wager you made and the order in which the numbers came in. Also, there is another group of prizes if you use the FIREBALL option.

Going 'ballistic' for their Powerball win

Another lucky player hit it big playing the Virginia Lottery. The Lottery announced that John Woods of Newport won $150,000 playing Powerball recently.

Woods bought his ticket for the April 15 Powerball drawing, but then he completely forgot about it. The next day, his wife saw the ticket and checked the winning numbers.

Woods told Lottery officials:

She went ballistic, so I knew we'd won something!

Winning is what they did, as the ticket matched four of the winning numbers that night plus the Powerball number. While this normally pays $50,000, Woods also spent the extra dollar for the Power Play option. Power Play tripled the prize that night, so Woods and his wife won $150,000.

Woods purchased the ticket at 7-Eleven, located at 9512 Warwick Boulevard in Newport News. He chose the Easy Pick option when buying his ticket, so the computer generated the numbers for him on this winning ticket.

The winning numbers for the April 15 drawing were 7, 16, 41, 56, and 61, and the Powerball number was 23.

Enjoy playing the Virginia Lottery, and please remember to play responsibly.