The only thing better than winning at Jeopardy?
Winning again.
Matthew Church, a Prince George native studying medicine at Queen’s University, won his second straight match on the famous TV quiz show, coming from behind in Final Jeopardy for the win.
“I did not see this coming. I thought I had my fun and amusing story, but that was it. Never thought I’d win twice,” he says.
Church, who won $24,000 in his first game Monday, now has a total of $29,000 after his $5,000 win tonight.
It may have been a 24-hour wait for the audience between the two games, but it was considerably shorter for Church.
“Even though I’m wearing different clothes, the game actually about 20 minutes after I first won,” he said.
“I was blown away with excitement, I had accomplished everything I wanted to do on Jeopardy…I was sort of just riding the emotional high from there. There’s very little time to refocus.”
“All the stagehands backstage call you champ, which is cool though,” he added.
Church was slower on the buzzer in his second game, and went into Final Jeopardy! in third place with $5400, with the leader at $9,000. The category was “Classical Music” – an area that Church admits “is a weaker area” for him – and he bet just $400.
He guessed wrong. But so did everyone else, with larger wagers. And when the numbers were subtracted, Church was still champion.
“The beauty of being in third place, is that if it’s a tough question, if everyone gets it wrong, you can come from behind,” he said.
It’s been a whirlwind two days for Church, who returned home to Prince George today after completing his final exam on Monday.
“When I was in the Vancouver Airport, a lot of people recognized me, which was surreal,” he says.
“They knew my name, or said ‘weren’t you the guy on Jeopardy?’ If you’re going to be famous for something for a little, this is a good thing to be famous for.”
Because of the quirks of his exam schedule, Church was able to watch his first win with friends at Queen’s and his second with family back home. He’s savouring every moment of this once in a lifetime experience – and learning how to respond when people ask “how come you know so much?”
“I’ve always been interested in the news from a young age,” he says.
“Some of my first memories are geopolitical shakeups in the early 90s, and that’s fairly unusual for a very young person. I try and always stay interested in the world around me.
“It’s got me pretty far in life, and got me pretty far in Jeopardy.”
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