In what can aptly be described as the Super Bowl for trivia nerds, Nova Scotia’s Jeopardy! superchampion Mattea Roach will take to the Alex Trebek Stage once again for the show’s annual Tournament of Champions. She’ll compete against other top contestants from the past year vying to be crowned the best of the best and win a $250,000 prize. The Halifax native finished her first run on the quiz show in May after winning 23 games and taking home $560,983 USD—earning a place on the Jeopardy! “leaderboard of legends” as the fifth-best J! player of all time, both in terms of games won and cash winnings.
But Roach isn’t the only legendary player coming back for this year’s TOC. She’ll be up against Amy Schneider and Matt Amodio, who have the second-longest (40 games in a row) and third-longest (38) winning streaks in the game’s history, respectively. Also in the tournament is Ryan Long, the 10th-winningest J! champ with 16 wins. To put it simply, this is the most stacked Tournament of Champions yet.
The tournament kicks off on Monday, Oct. 31 and begins with six quarterfinal matches. We won’t see Roach until Tuesday, Nov. 8, when the competition pauses and she’ll play a friendly exhibition game with Schneider and Amodio. As the top three players, they advanced to the semi-finals automatically. Schneider will compete in the first semi-final on Nov. 9, Amodio in the second on November 10 and Roach in the third on Nov. 11. The winner of each of these games advances to the finals, and whoever is first to win three games in the finals wins the tournament.
Again, if you want to tune in to cheer on our Haligonian J! champ, her first episodes are on Nov. 8 and 11, and stay tuned for updates from The Coast if she advances to the finals. If you have cable, Jeopardy! airs at 8:30pm AT on CBS. The episodes usually end up on YouTube well before then, but you didn’t hear that from us.