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Rowan Ward
Rowan ward
Name: rowan ward
Birth Hometown: Chicago, Illinois
Occupation: chart caller, writer, and editor
Known for: 2022 Jeopardy! SC week 2 Winner

Rowan Ward is a chart caller, writer, and editor from Chicago, Illinois.

Jeopardy! Run[]

Regular Game[]

She first appeared on the show on August 13, 2021, on the last day of Season 37, and went up against 17-day champion Matt Amodio. She played almost toe-to-toe with Matt for the entirety of the first round and was the first person to lead him after the Jeopardy! Round (and the only person to do so in a case where he did not miss a $5,000+ Daily Double late in the round). She continued playing almost equal to him through Double Jeopardy!, with the round only being decided by the two Daily Doubles; Matt gained $7,800 on his, whereas rowan lost $5,000 on theirs.

Because of this, rowan went into Final Jeopardy with exactly half of Matt's score, but a single-get on Matt's part meant he would win his 18th game, while Rowan was knocked out in their very first game. Matt would go on to win 20 more games - the first 20 games of Season 38 - before being beaten by 11-game champion Jonathan Fisher and fellow Second Chance Competition winner Jessica Stephens in his 39th game.

Second Chance Competition[]

Because of rowan's impressive performance in their original game, she was brought back in the 2022 Second Chance Competition, a competition that was designed to give second chances to 18 players who had played valiantly but lost their only game.

Her semifinal saw them go up against Nikkee Porcaro and Do Park. She held a slight lead at the first commercial break but picked up 13 of the 16 clues remaining after the break to jump into a $7,400 lead. She found the first Double Jeopardy Daily Double with a $7,800 lead over Do, but shockingly wagered their entire bank of $10,600 on the clue and got it right. That Daily Double locked up the game for rowan then and there, as she entered Final Jeopardy with $26,800, almost a $20,000 lead over second-place Nikkee.

Her performance in the first day of the Finals, against Jack Weller and Sadie Goldberger, was even more impressive - she picked up 11 correct before the first break, another 7 after (for 18 total in the Jeopardy round), and 19 in Double Jeopardy!, for an incredible 37 correct before the Final round. According to thejeopardyfan.com, she successfully rang in first on 66.67% of all the non-Daily Double clues in the entire game.

She entered Final Jeopardy with $30,000, almost a $20,000 lead over second-place Jack - and that score was after dropping $8,000 on the second Daily Double. While Jack put up a very strong comeback to make the second day's Final Jeopardy matter, that Final was a Triple Stumper, and rowan's Day 1 lead was just too massive for Jack to stay ahead of; thus, rowan picked up the $35,000 first prize and advanced to the Tournament of Champions.

Tournament of Champions[]

On the fourth quarterfinal game, she faced 7-game champion Courtney Shah and 4-day champion John Focht. She played almost toe-to-toe with John for the first 42 clues of the game; however, John picked up a combined $11,000 on back-to-back Daily Doubles, and the added momentum was just too much for rowan to keep up with. She entered Final Jeopardy in second place and took home the $5,000 consolation prize, while John would lose his semifinal to eventual second-runner up Sam Buttrey, though he would finish ahead of Matt Amodio.

Trivia[]

  • She is the first ToC entrant from non-binary[1], and a participant who appeared in ToC after changing their name[2].
  • As she won the SCT, it became the first case that all three people who competed together advanced. Also, with Jessica Stephens competing against Matt Amodio winning the SCT, it became the first case of three people competing together in ToC. However, all three players failed to make it through the Quarterfinal, and as Matt, who was a strong candidate for the championship, was caught by Sam, S37 became a season in which not a single player, following S21 and S28, advanced to the ToC finals. Additionally, Matt's former champion and CWC winner, Josh Saak, also received the same result in ToC.

References[]

  1. Later, another non-binary Deb Bilodeau won the Wildcard champion competition and became the second person to qualify for ToC.
  2. Prior to that, Catherine Ramen appeared in ToC, but under a different name.
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