WARNING: JEOPARDY! SPOILERS AHEAD! DO NOT SCROLL DOWN UNLESS YOU’VE WATCHED THE JAN. 9 EPISODE OR WANT IT SPOILED!
Are we all ready?
Okay.
On Tuesday, we saw the first round of Jeopardy! The Greatest of All Time, pitting legendary champions James Holzhauer, Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter against each other in a multi-night battle to declare who’s the GOAT of the quiz show hosted by Alex Trebek. After all the joking trash talk and possible leaks, we finally got to the actual games.
Jennings took the first game, and Holzhauer took the second, so both of them were two wins away from an overall victory.
Here are the results from Thursday night — we’ll break it down to the two games the trio played, along with who won the entire second match (and again: SPOILER ALERT! Everything is below this awesome photo of Holzhauer and Alex Trebek):
(Photo by Eliot J. Schechter/NHLI via Getty Images)
Tell me if you’ve heard this one before — Holzhauer led after the first round and Rutter was in third. And once again, Rutter got a chance with a Daily Double early in the second round but missed. Jennings went all in with 9,200 points on the other Daily Double and nailed the answer. By the end of Double Jeopardy, Jennings held the lead with 25,600, Holzhauer had 13,600 and Rutter had 8,800.
The Final Jeopardy category was U.S. Political History, and here was the clue:
These 2 now-defunct parties each gave the U.S. 4 presidents in the 19th century.
All three got the answer: What are the Democratic-Republican and Whigs?
And it’s worth noting they all bet ALL OF THEIR POINTS!
Their scores after the first game were:
Jennings: 51,200
Holzhauer: 27,200
Rutter: 17,600
Holzhauer started the match getting answers left and right, accruing 5,000 points before finding a Daily Double, he went all in … and he missed!
Jennings took the lead in the first round with Rutter in third. Rutter got a Daily Double correct, then followed that up with another DD that he got. Holzhauer struggled with a handful of wrong answers (to be fair, he had to be aggressive after that first game) and Jennings took advantage. After Double Jeopardy, Jennings led with 17,600, Rutter had 10,000 and Holzhauer had 7,400.
The Final Jeopardy category was 21st Century Oscar Winners and here was clue:
These 2 foreign-born directors have each won 2 Best Director Oscars, but none of their films has won Best Picture.
Here were the scores after Final Jeopardy, which none of them got: “Who are Alfonso Cuaron and Ang Lee?”
Jennings: 16,400
Rutter: 5,867
Holzhauer: 6,492
Remember, the winner of the night is the total points scored in both games together. So here are the final totals:
Jennings: 67,600
Holzhauer: 33,692
Rutter: 23,467
Ken Jennings won and has two victories, one away from the GOAT title and $1 million. Holzhauer has one win and Rutter has zero.
