The years of watching Jeopardy, and the month of standing in his living room practicing before he flew to Hollywood to compete have paid off for Government Professor Tom Nichols. His two-day total is $24,200.
As the returning champion, Nichols played a consistently strong game last night, with his winnings hovering at $10,000 for most of the show. He confidently controlled the Politicians category and easily answered the Daily Double in that category.
When he received the news that he had been selected to appear on Jeopardy last October, Nichols must have felt the same way a minor league ball player does when he gets the call to the majors.
His first reaction was, "Oh my god, I'm going on Jeopardy," he said.
But after the initial elation about appearing on the show, Nichols said the prospect was a bit daunting.
"On the one hand it was really exciting," Nichols said. "On the other, I was scared of making a fool of myself in front of 30 million people."
Nichols said Jeopardy has been a passion of his since he was a kid.
"I've wanted to go on Jeopardy for 20 years," he said. "When I was a kid, and I'd stay home sick from school, I'd watch the show with my mom. She'd come home and make me lunch and we'd watch it together."
Nichols said one of his fears was to face a category that should be easy for him, such as his specialty, the Soviet Union, and blow it when it came time to give the right question.
When Nichols encountered categories another player excelled in but he did not feel comfortable with, he said his strategy was to gain control and put the play in more familiar category.
"The strategy for a category is to take it away and go elsewhere." he said.
So far, Politicians and Weapons were two of Nichols' favorite categories.
Nichols said he had to quickly assess his chances in relation to his competitors and place a bet. "With a category like Politicians, how wrong can I go? So I bet a lot," he said.
"If there was a classic Tom Category, it would be Weapons," said Nichols, who is wary of "funky" categories such as The National Gallery of Art or US Commemorative Coins, both on last night's show.
But the poker face that Nichols wore during the last two nights' games effectively hid a mind moving at a blinding pace, processing the categories, making the wagers and still keeping track of what his opponents were doing.
