One of the hallmarks of a great
Jeopardy champion is the ability to do math quickly. And for the six players in
the final two matches in the knockout rounds, there was a different kind of
arithmetic in play for the three final spots in the quarterfinals.
For Adriana Harmeyer, Matt Amodio
and Victoria Groce the math offers slightly more room for error. Each of them
had 1 match point from their second place finishes in the first three matches.
The winner of their game would automatically advance. So would the second place
finisher as 2 points would be sufficient to get the fifth spot. Third place was
the end of the road.
But for Brad Rutter, Nilesh
Vinjamuri and Juveria Zaheer, the arithmetic for them was far less forgiving.
None of them had any match points which meant that only the winner of their
game was guaranteed to move on. Second and third were going home.
None of these six players had any
room for error. An incorrect Daily Double could spell the death knell for their
hopes in Double Jeopardy. Final Jeopardy would be critical even if either game
ended in a runaway – the results of the third knockout game had proven that
point. Two of the players were former Masters and one had been a seasoned
Tournament veteran before this. Would that prove an advantage over the three
remaining newcomers in these final two games?
MATCH 1:
Victoria Groce vs. Matt Amodio vs
Adriana Harmeyer
The early stages of the Jeopardy
round were pretty much an even fight between Victoria and Matt. Then after
Victoria pulled into the lead she found the first Daily Double in
ORGANIZATIONS. With 4800 points to bet, she wagered them all:
This humanitarian organization that
provides medical care in more than 70 countries
won the 1999 Nobel Peace Prize.”
Not only did Victoria know the
answer, she showed off: “What is Medicine son Frontières?, the original
name of ‘Doctors Without Borders’ She finished the Jeopardy round with 11,400
points to Matt’s 4200 and Adriana’s 2200.
Both the Daily Doubles in Double
Jeopardy were found incredibly early. For Adriana it was probably too early:
she found the Daily Double on the first clue she picked: ‘T.M.’, I.” She bet
the 2200 points she had in front of her:
In an 1824 Article for Britannica,
he wrote about ‘Keeping population on a level with the means of substance.”
Adriana knew it was: “”Who it was
Thomas Malthus?” and moved into second place.
However two clues later Victoria
found the other Daily Double in ON THE OLD CABIN’S BOOKSHELF with 15,000 points,
stopping Matt and Adriana’s best chance to make up ground. She bet 5000 points:
There are several water-damaged
books on fishing, including this Montana set Norman McLean tale ‘and Other
Stories’. Victoria
knew it was:” “What’s A River Runs Through It?” and moved up to 20,000
points early.
Neither Matt nor Adriana gave up
the attempt the catch her but Victoria just managed to hold on to a runaway
with 27,200 points to Matt’s 13,000 and Adriana’s 6800. Victoria has officially
clinched her spot in the quarterfinals but Matt and Adriana still had to fight
it out for the second spot.
The Final Jeopardy category was
18TH CENTURY SCIENCE:
Naturalist The Count De Buffon
mocked North and South American animals, like this ‘elephant of the New World…the
size of a very small mule.”
I had no idea what this clue
referred to but all three players did. And for Adriana there was a special
pressure: it was an animal clue. Adriana’s response was revealed first: “What
is the tapir?” That was correct. Adriana bet 6500 points, putting her at
13,300. Matt wagered 601, putting him at 13,601. Victoria also knew it was the
tapir but bet nothing. It didn’t matter.
Victoria advanced to the next round
and Matt’s one point was enough to move him on to the quarterfinals. Adriana
was the first Master to leave with $15,000.
Interview segments: Adriana said
that one of her helpers for studying was her six-year old nephew who primarily
helped her with animal clues. Ken said he hoped to see him on the Jeopardy stage
someday. Matt remarked on how much his life has changed since his original
appearance on Jeopardy, including the fact that he now has a girlfriend, a Ph.
D and a job (he emphasized he gave enough attention to it to his advisor). In typical
self-effacing fashion, he joked about how many games he’d lost on Jeopardy in
the last few years. Victoria said that in the year since she last appeared on
Jeopardy she’d made a book proposal and now her first book was going to be
published and it was about using cognitive science to remember things. Ken
asked Matt and Adriana if they noticed that. Matt and Adriana joked: That sounds
about right.
MATCH 2
Nilesh Vinjamuri vs. Juveria
Zaheer vs. Brad Rutter
In the Jeopardy round Nilesh and
Juveria were face to face with the Brad Rutter of old. Juveria had a chance to
get ahead of him early when she found the Daily Double In RIVERS. She bet the
2000 points she had:
This name of a great river means ‘Son
of’ a Hindu creator god.
She knew it was the Brahmaputra and took the lead with 4000. It didn’t matter
much; Brad didn’t make a single mistake in the round, sweeping the category
SHOP TALK (he took the clues out of order so his weep wasn’t noticed) and
finished in the lead with 9000 points to Juveria’s 4400 and Nilesh’s 1600.
In Double Jeopardy Juveria slowly
got started and had 7600 points when she found the first Daily Double in
BIOLOGIST BIO:
Juveria: “Well if it’s the last
time I ever do this, 7600.
(applause and cheers)
In 1929, way before she wrote a
few bestsellers, she did post-grad work at the marine biological lab in Woods
Hole, Maine.”
Juveria tentatively said: “Who is
Carson?” It was Rachel Carson and she was in the lead. She got two more clues
correct in HISTORICAL ARTIFACTS (she got three out of five altogether) before
she found the other Daily Double in STARTS WITH 2 VOWELS. With 17,200 she was a
bit more cautious, betting 4000 points:
From 936 to 1531, most German kings
were crowned in this city. “ She
replied: “What is Aachen?” and moved up to 21,200.
Brad didn’t surrender and at the
end of Double Jeopardy he had more than enough to keep her from running away
with the game: 15,800 points to Juveria’s 26,800. Nilesh struggled against them
both and only finished with 4000 points.
The Final Jeopardy category was
AMERICAN COMPOSERS: After he died in 1990 at age 90, his ashes were scattered
at Tanglewood, where he taught for 25 years & where his music was
performed.”
Nilesh’s response was revealed
first: “Who is Bernstein?” It was incorrect. He wagered everything he had. Brad’s
response was next: He wrote down: “Who is Fiedler?”, crossed it out, and wrote
in Ives. Ken said Ives was wrong. It cost him 11,201 points. It came down to
Juveria. She had written down: “Who is Fiedler?” That was also incorrect. The
correct response: “Who is Aaron Copeland?” (For the record, I wrote that down.
It was a blind guess on my part; I thought I was wrong.) Juveria’s wager was 6000
points, which dropped her 20,800 but was more than enough to give her the win
and three match points.
For Brad and Nilesh the Masters
ended her but Nilesh had performed superbly in his first game and Brad more
than brilliant in tonight’s game (he gave just one incorrect response in the
entire match). Adriana had played well enough in both her matches but had been
the victim of two runaways victories.
Interview segment: Ken cheered
Brad about his 25 year career on Jeopardy, marking how good he still looked.
Asked if he had any memories of Jeopardy Brad talked about how he got to the
first Daily Double in the Greatest of All Time Tournament: “I knew the clue was
Potemkin but I had Anna Karenina on my mind and I said Count Vronsky and it was
pretty much all downhill after that…You were there, I don’t have to remind you.”
Juveria talked about her weakness of ‘2020s hotties’ but that she’s very close
with the most recent winners on Pop Culture Jeopardy who have become her study
buddies since. Nilesh remarked about being the youngest Master in the
Tournament and added about how he had to study for older stuff like 1970s and 1980s
pop culture (both Brad and Ken playfully objected to this) and remarked that he
had brought his high school librarian with him in the audience because he had
been one of the biggest influences in trying out for Jeopardy.
LEADERBOARD AFTER MAY 14TH
Yogesh Rout – 6 Match Points
Victoria Groce – 4 Match Points
Roger Craig – 4 Match Points
Juveria Zaheer – 3 Match Points
Isaac Hirsch – 3 Match Points
Matt Amodio – 2 Match Points
Adriana Harmeyer – 1 Match Point
(eliminated)
Brad Rutter - 1 Match Point (eliminated)
Nilesh Vinjamuri – 0 Match points
(eliminated)
And so going into the quarterfinals
we have an intriguing lineup. All three former Masters from last year are back
for the quarterfinals. All three players who were in the Finals of the 2025 JIT
are in the quarterfinals (Matt, Roger, Juveria). And two of the three finalists
in the 2025 Tournament of Champions, Nilesh and Adriana are going home after
the knockout rounds as is Brad Rutter, though less ignominiously then he did in
his last appearance on Jeopardy.
Other interesting facts about the
knockout rounds so far:
Victoria, Roger and Matt are the
only players to respond correctly on both Final Jeopardys they have had so far
in this tournament. Juveria, Isaac and Yogesh have yet to respond correctly on
any of them so far.
With two second place finishes
Matt already has more match points than he managed to accumulate in the entire
2024 Jeopardy Masters. He also has not won a single game in the Jeopardy
Masters since his semi-final victory in the 2023 Masters that qualified him.
This is already a fascinating
lineup for the Masters going into the quarterfinals, a very good mix of the old
and the new. Roger, Juveria and Isaac already each have a win to their credit
and all three have proven that they can play brilliantly against Jeopardy
legends: Roger has defeated Matt Amodio, Isaac managed to defeated Adriana,
Juveria managed to defeat Brad Rutter. How will things change in the quarterfinals?
We’ll start finding out Tuesday
and Wednesday. Stay tuned for the complete report on Thursday.
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