A dollar and a dream. So the saying goes when it comes to entering lotteries.

With the odds of matching all five balls in the $1 Quick Pick ticket he bought being 1 in 962,598, Michael Pepper of Wilmington could not have felt too confident.

“You never really expect to win big, but there’s always that chance,” Pepper said in a news release issued by the North Carolina Education Lottery.

Still, Pepper remained doubtful he would ever win a big prize. The odds were just too slim.

But Pepper hit the $100,000 Cash 5 jackpot on Sept. 20. He had a hard time believing it at first.

“I thought it was fake at first,” he said. “Then I texted my brother and said, ‘It looks like I’m a winner.’”

Pepper claimed his prize Sept. 25 at lottery headquarters in Raleigh. After federal and state tax withhol

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