When Helen Magda of Willow Springs opened an email from the North Carolina Education Lottery telling her she won $150,000 she couldn’t believe her eyes.

“I was sitting at my computer and I opened up my emails and I saw it and I said, ‘Oh, yeah right, sure, it came from the North Carolina Lottery. It can’t be true!’” she recalled. “I started crying, saying, ‘I hope this is true, I hope this is true.’”

Magda’s entry was chosen from 30,341,000 to win the top prize in the lottery’s final 2020 Holiday Luck Second Chance Drawing on Wednesday.

“You know I always thought I’d be cool as a cucumber if I ever won a lot of money,” said Magda as she claimed her prize Friday at lottery headquarters. “But that went totally down the drain!”

Magda is no stranger to second-chance winnings. In fact, she’s won a second-chance drawing once before!

“This is the second time I’ve won a second chance,” she said. “The first time I won $500. I always say, ‘If I win, I win, but if I don’t, I don’t but I’m still gonna scan ‘em!’”

After federal and state tax withholdings, Magda took home $106,125 and says it will “definitely go to pay off bills.”

Ticket sales from scratch-offs make it possible for the lottery to raise more than $725 million per year for education. For details on how $62.8 million raised by the lottery made a difference in Wake County last year, visit www.nclottery.com and click on the “Impact” section.