Everything You Need to Know About the Intense ‘Jeopardy! Masters’ Season 2

Jeopardy! lovers, mark your calendars: Jeopardy! Masters season two debuts on May 1, 2024, at 8 p.m. EST on ABC, and will be streaming on Hulu the next day. The 10-episode series, which is hosted by Ken Jennings, will feature the six highest-ranked current Jeopardy! contestants competing to win $500,000 and the Trebek Trophy, and it’s sure to have viewers on the edge of their seats.

To brush up on how the contestants got this far, you can stream every episode of Jeopardy! for free on Pluto TV.

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How does Jeopardy! Masters work? 

In each episode, there are two standard games of Jeopardy!, with two groups of three competing to earn match points. The winner gets three match points, second place gets one match point, and third place gets no points. Anyone who doesn’t make it to Final Jeopardy! gets an automatic zero for that round. 

After the first two games, the two winners of the previous episode will automatically face each other for games three through 14. Their third opponent will be drawn at random, and the other three contestants will compete with each other later that evening. 

At the end of episode seven, the two players with the fewest match points will be eliminated, and go home with $50,000 for the sixth place winner and $75,000 for the fifth place winner. 

Then come episodes eight and nine, in which the four remaining contests compete in the semifinals. All four of them will face each other in every combination possible, and the person with the lowest amount of match points will go home with $100,000. 

From there, the top three contestants will compete in two games of Jeopardy!. Match points will be set to zero and the person who has the most points at the end of both games will win $500,000 and the Trebek Trophy. Whoever wins second place gets $250,000 and whoever wins third place gets $150,000. 

In the event of a tie, all the correct responses for those two games (including Final Jeopardy!) will be added up, and the person with the highest number will become the winner. 

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Who is competing in Jeopardy! Masters this season? 

This season’s six competitors include a former Jeopardy! Masters contestant, a former Jeopardy! Masters winner, a Tournament of Champions winner and an Invitational Tournament winner. Read on to meet the impressive contestants.

Jeopardy! Masters: James Holzhauer

James Holzhauer is best known for going all in on Daily Doubles. He first appeared on Jeopardy! in 2019 and remained on it for 39 episodes before he lost later that same year. Then, in 2020, he competed in Jeopardy! The Greatest of All Time and gave clues in Celebrity Jeopardy! in 2023. His latest Jeopardy! appearance was in 2023, when he competed in the first season of Jeopardy! Masters and won.

In between games, the 39-year-old Holzhauer is a professional sports gambler in Las Vegas. His current Jeopardy! stats include 71 of 75 correct Daily Doubles and 97% accuracy in both Final and regular Jeopardy!. He has earned $2,462,216 in total, making him the third-highest-earning American game show contestant of all time.

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Mattea Roach 

25-year-old Mattea Roach is originally from Toronto, Ontario, and is known for their impressive 23-game winning streak in 2022. They also appeared as a clue giver in Celebrity Jeopardy! in 2023 and in season one of Jeopardy! Masters that same year. Roach came in second place. 

Currently, they hosts the The Backbench, a Canadian political podcast.

Jeopardy! Masters: Matt Amodio

Matt Amodio is a mathematician and Postdoctoral Researcher at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. He first appeared on Jeopardy! in 2021 and won 38 consecutive games, earning him the title of the third-longest streak holder. Like Roach and Holzhauer, Amodio was also on the first season of Jeopardy! Masters and was a clue giver on Celebrity Jeopardy!  

The 33-year-old, who’s originally from Ohio, has written many scholarly articles about deep learning and generative modeling. In his free time, he builds predictive models for baseball statistics.  

Yogesh Raut 

Originally from Vancouver, Washington, Yogesh Raut won Jeopardy! The Tournament of Champions in March 2024, after a 12-episode winning streak in regular Jeopardy!.

Viewers are mixed on Raut, as some claim he has an aggressive buzzer technique. Aside from appearing on Jeopardy!, the 38-year-old Raut has worked on visual effects for the movies Death on the Nile (2022) and Horizon Line (2020). He has a background in cognitive and behavioral science.

Jeopardy! Masters: Victoria Groce

Victoria Groce is definitely the underdog going into Jeopardy! Masters. She first appeared in two episodes of regular Jeopardy! in 2005, back when Alex Trebek was hosting. Then, in 2024, she was invited to the first-ever Jeopardy! Invitational Tournament and won, granting her a ticket to Jeopardy! Masters. 

Groce, who grew up in Georgia and now resides in Pittsburgh with her husband and daughter, was also on the game show The Chase from 2022 to 2023. The 41-year-old is passionate about knitting, and has even been known to knit while participating in competitions.

Amy Schneider 

Rounding out the Jeopardy! Masters contestants is writer and former software engineer Amy Schneider. She currently holds the second-longest winning streak record, with 40 wins under her belt, second only to Ken Jennings. Schneider first appeared on the show in 2021 and went on to win the Tournament of Champions in 2022. She was invited to the Invitational Tournament in 2024 but lost in game four.

The 44-year old currently lives with her wife in Oakland, California, and published a book, In the Form of a Question: The Joys and Rewards of a Curious Life, in 2023.