Just yesterday, Rudolph Thompson of Stantonsburg stopped at the grocery store on his way home to buy a lottery ticket and that lucky ticket scored him a $100,000 prize.

Thompson, a retired truck driver, bought his lucky $25 Extreme Cash scratch-off ticket at the SJ Mart H on Herring Ave Northeast in Wilson and played it right there in the parking lot.

“I’ve never won anything like this before,” said Thompson. He said he called his wife right away to share his good fortune. “She was so happy,” he recalled. “And I was just overwhelmed.”

Thompson claimed his prize Wednesday at lottery headquarters in Raleigh. After state and federal taxes, he took home $70,757.

With his winnings, Thompson said he plans “to pay off some bills and put the rest in the bank.”

Extreme Cash launched in March with three top prizes of $1 million and 10 prizes of $100,000. Two $1 million prizes and five $100,000 prizes remain to be claimed.

Ticket sales from scratch-offs make it possible for the lottery to raise more than $700 million per year for education. For details on how $4.4 million raised by the lottery made a difference in Wilson County last year, visit www.nclottery.com and click on the “Impact” section.