Oklahoma Players Help Push Powerball Jackpot To Near Record Level

The Powerball lottery is approaching its largest jackpot ever with another drawing coming up on Saturday.

The current jackpot is $310 million.  Powerball recently raised the cost of a ticket to $2 per play which it says is increasing the jackpot faster than before.

The drawing will be held just before 10 p.m. Saturday.

To pick the winning numbers, Powerball draws five white balls out of a drum of 59 balls and one red ball out of a drum with 35 red balls.

The number of red balls used to be higher.  Powerball says dropping the amount of red balls down to 35 increases the chances of winning the jackpot.

Right now, the odds of winning are 1 in 175 million.

The highest jackpot ever for the Powerball was $365 million back in February 2006.