'Jeopardy!' Champ Amy Schneider Scores Third Longest Streak In History!

Current “Jeopardy!” champion Amy Schneider is on a hot streak!

Amy has broken many “Jeopardy!” records since she first appeared on the show. One of the first milestones she passed was becoming the first openly trans contestant to appear on the 2022 Tournament of Champions.

In late December, she became the woman with the longest-running streak in “Jeopardy!” history, and the woman with the highest total earnings. Then she passed the million-dollar mark, to become the fifth millionaire in “Jeopardy!” history and the fourth to do so during regular gameplay.

Earlier this week, fans were wondering if Amy Schneider would be able to move up in the “Jeopardy!” Hall of Fame leaderboard. Current host Ken Jennings has the highest win streak with 74 games, set back in 2004. In early September, Matt Amodio set a new record with 38 games. James Holzhauer sat in third place with 32 games set back in 2019.

At least, until today…

On Friday, January 14, Amy Schneider made history by beating James Holzhauer’s record to have the third-longest winning streak in “Jeopardy!” history. Amy was up against Rachel, a full-time parent, and Luis, a financial passenger service.

In the first “Jeopardy!” round, the contestants faced categories like, “Fear,” “Words & Phrases,” and “Oats.” Going into the “Double Jeopardy!,” Amy was already leading with $9,000 compared to Rachel’s $3,000 and Luis’ $600.

But fans know that anything can happen in “Double Jeopardy!” and with categories like “World History,” “Character Test,” and “Bobbing For Actors,” the game was anyone’s to win or lose. However, Amy swept through most of the categories to score a comfortable lead of $30,200 going into the final “Jeopardy!” round. Rachel had $3,800 and Luis had $3,000.

The “Final Jeopardy!” category was “Cemeteries and Memorials” and the answer was “60,000 are at rest in a National Memorial Cemetery opened in 1949 in the crater of an extinct volcano in this state.”

Everyone missed what seemed like an obvious question of “What is Hawaii?” and Amy dropped down to score a 33-day total of $1,111,800! During the episode, Ken also noted that Amy has now scored over one thousand clues correctly during her time on the show!

Before Amy’s episode aired, host Ken Jennings took to Twitter to tease her potential record-breaking win.

“In terms of game strategy, Amy is almost the anti-Holzhauer… but she has equaled his 32-game streak and can pass him today,” he wrote.

James has made a name for himself for his all-in “Jeopardy!” wagers and has cleared the top ten leaderboard in the “Jeopardy!” Hall of Fame for highest single-day winnings. His highest total won in a single episode was $131,127, which was set on April 17, 2019. His lowest high score was $89,229, which was set on May 20, 2019.

During the clip, Ken talked about her winning streak with Amy behind the podium.

“Amy Schneider, our returning champion from Oakland,” Ken begins. “Now tied with James Holzhauer. And I love it when anybody gets to put something in James Holzhauer’s face, don’t get me wrong, but what’s that like? Like, what were your expectations for yourself coming onto the show?”

“I mean, coming onto the show, I mean, I was confident,” she replied. “I knew that if things go my way, I could win three or four games, but I… it wasn’t anything like this, for sure. But, yeah, once I started getting a streak going, and realizing that did sort of become a target of mine. He’s a… divisive contestant, I suppose.”

“I love James, but he’s a target of mine too,” Ken replied with a laugh.

Matt Amodio, the Yale University Ph.D. student in computer science that set a new record when the current season began in September, has yet to publicly comment on Amy’s win streak. He has won 38 games, so with Amy sitting at 33 games as of Friday, she is now only one week away from tying Matt’s score.

Is it possible that Amy could have the second-highest win streak in “Jeopardy” history? Fans can’t wait to find out!