100 Games Into Season 41 of Jeopardy, Your Crib Sheet for The 2025 Tournament of Champions

But First How Champions Wild Card Turned Out

Before I give the official recap for the Finals of Champions Wildcard, tonight’s match marked the end of the first 100 days of Season 41 of Jeopardy. And having had to go through a short postseason that has been both thrilling and led to deserving winners, it is also time to give the official lineup for the 2025 Tournament of Champions which has been released which I will do at the end of the article.

Now let’s move on to the two game final.

Game 1

From the start of the Jeopardy round this was an almost evenly matched battle between all three players. A blunder on the first Daily Double didn’t hamper Will Yancey that much and he rebuilt a lead but Mehal got the last six clues of the round correct and a $1000 swing on the final clue put him in the lead with $5200 to Will’s $4800. Drew was not that far out with $2800.

Drew started Double Jeopardy strong with a near run of THIS ONE TIME, AT ORCHESTRA CAMP but then Will managed to get rolling and found the first Daily Double in ALLITERATIVE LIT. He bet $3800, half his total:

“Feeling familiar, Henry V says, “We few, we happy few, we” this group. It took Will a moment to come up with: “What is band of brothers?” He jumped into the lead with $11,400. Mehal then got the next three clues correct to retake the lead.

Will then got to the other Daily Double in JANUARY BABIES. He had $13,400 and had a small lead over Mehal. Cautiously he wagered $3000:

“In 1929 at age 21 she finished second behind Jean-Paul Sartre in an advanced philosophy exam.” Will admitted he was stumped. The clue referred to Simone de Beauvoir and he dropped to $10,400. Double Jeopardy ended with Mehal still ahead with $15,200 to Will’s $13,800 and Drew’s impressive $10,800. Mehal had responded correctly on 21 clues and only gotten one wrong. Will had given nineteen correct response but had given a whopping six incorrect ones, including two of the three Daily Doubles.

The Final Jeopardy category was an old favorite: WORLD GEOGRAPHY. “In the Orenburg Oblast a bridge over this 1500-mile river has monuments labeled ‘Asia’ and ‘Europe’

Drew’s response was revealed first. He wrote down: “What is the Ural River?” That was correct. The mountains that divide Asia and Europe are named for this river. (I didn’t know it either.) Drew bet $6800, putting him at $17,600.

Will had the right idea: “What is the Volga?” (This is, for the record, the first Final Jeopardy in his six appearances in the postseason he got wrong.) It cost him $6000.

Mehal wrote down the Ural River, crossed it out and wrote it down again. He went very big, wagering $12,000.

At the end of Game 1, Mehal had $27,200 to Drew’s $17,600 and Will’s $5600. Mehal’s lead was sizable but as both Drew and Will have firsthand knowledge of from their experience in the Second Chance Tournament, being in a distant second or third at the end of the first game of a final can change very quickly in Game 2. Will was lucky to hold on to win his Second Chance despite the superb play of his fellow finalists; Drew had won his Tournament because he had done so. And all three players had basically been evenly matched in Game 1 to start with.

Game 2

Mehal got off to a fast start in the Jeopardy round — what appeared to be too fast a start. He found the Daily Double on the second clue in PLACES TO VISIT. With a mere $600 to wager he bet the $1000 he could:

“This river has been called the ‘Lifeline of the Southwest’, you can see where it meets the Green River in Canyonlands National Park.” Mehal knew it was the Colorado. Drew then took off and at the end of the round had a sizable lead with $9200 to Mehal’s $5400 while Will Trailed with $1200.

Drew got to the first Daily Double in Double Jeopardy on the second clue, finding it in HISTORIC STATES AND TERRITORIES. He was in the lead with $10,400 but he knew he had to make up ground and bet $3400:

“Until 1949 islands including Sumatra and Java made up a territory known by this 3-word name.” He struggled before he guessed: “What is Dutch East India?” He was a couple letters off; it was Dutch East Indies, now Indonesia.

Mehal would get to the other Daily Double in CHANGE THE MIDDLE LETTER: It required two responses. He bet $4000:

“Heroic bravery in battle becomes a visible exhalation of steam. He didn’t hesitate: “What are valor and vapor?” This put him at $16,200. He would hold his lead until the end of Double Jeopardy giving 19 correct responses without a single incorrect one. Drew also gave 19 but the Daily Double he got wrong cost him. At the end of Double Jeopardy Mehal had $19,000 to Drew’s $10,600 and Will was at $3600. With the previous days scores Mehal had locked up the Tournament.

Final Jeopardy was an exercise but all three players did take it seriously. (Good for them, by the way.) The category was COMPOSERS: “Troll Hill is the name of his country home, the grounds of which include a concert hall & a lakeside cabin where he worked.” None of the three players were correct but I will give them credit for their guesses.

Will wrote down: “Who is Wagner?” (Wagner wrote more than his share of operas about mythology.) It cost him everything. Drew wrote down: “Who is Humperdinck?” (It’s not a stretch to think that the man who wrote Hansel & Gretel might have a cabin by the lake.) That also cost him everything. Mehal wrote down: ‘Who is Sibelius?” Geographically he was close. The clue (and I was right in my guess) referred to Grieg, who wrote about trolls in his most famous work Peer Gynt. Mehal didn’t risk anything and he didn’t have to as he earned $100,000 and clinched his spot in the Tournament of Champions.

And though he very well didn’t know it at the time, so did Drew. Because Lisa Ann Walter is unable to appear in the Tournament of Champions the final spot will go to the player who finished second in Champions Wild Card. How fitting that Drew will get a Second Chance, one that he and Will both more than proved themselves worthy of in the last month.

Now let’s deal with what’s going to happen starting Monday.

The format of this year’s tournament will be modeled on the 2022 Tournament of Champions. There will be six quarterfinals matches that will produce six winners. The three biggest winners of Season 40 — Adriana Harmeyer, Drew Basile and Isaac Hirsch — have been granted byes to the semifinals and will have an exhibition match against each other before the semi-finals properly begin. I should also mention aside from those three players, none of the other eighteen participants have won more than five games so it will be far more difficult than last year to try and predict the outcome. That is true of every Tournament of Champions, to be sure, but with no Ryan Longs or Ray Lalonde’s playing the quarterfinals, its safe to say everyone involved is far more evenly matched than at any time in the post Alex Trebek era and will no doubt be far more difficult for upsets to happen, at least the same way they did last year.

Now I must add, due to a conflict Celebrity Jeopardy winner Lisa Ann Walter will not be able to participate in this Tournament of Champions. I have to say, as good as Ike Barnholtz was last year I’m slightly relieved. I truly believe at some level the Tournament of Champions should involve ‘regular people’ who have to earn celebrity by playing Jeopardy, not be one in advance.

Monday January 27th

Allison Betts: 5 games, $121,500

Will Wallace: 4 games, $79,998

Risabh Wuppalplati, 3 Games — $52,802

Tuesday January 28th

Amy Hummel — 5 Wins, $100,994

Grant DeYoung — 4 wins, $81,203

David Erb — 3 wins, $90,754

Wednesday January 29th

Greg Jolin — 5 wins, $135,002

Weckiai Rannila, 3 wins, $35,200

Neilesh Vinjamuri, 3 wins, $53,099

Thursday January 30th

Mehal Shah — 2 Wins, Champions Wild Card Winner — $146,062

Ryan Manton — 4 wins, $83,179

Will Stewart — 3 wins, $70,501

Friday January 31st

Mark Fitzpatrick, 5 wins, $107,201

Allison Gross — 3 wins, $44,598

Kevin Laskowski — 3 wins, $52,999

Monday February 3

Drew Goins, Second Chance Winner, Wild Card Runner Up, $75,000

Amer Kakirde — 4 wins, $55,899

Lucas Partridge — 3 days, $66,200

The lineup may not have the array of super-champions of recent years but it is an fairly evenly matched set of competitors going into the quarterfinals. We already know anything can happen in the Tournament of Champions and we’re going to start finding out Monday. I’ll be back with the results of the quarterfinals in a week and a half. I’m already breathless with anticipation.