Here are the contestants for day four of the Professors Tournament:
- Julia, an English professor at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, whose department wants to create well-rounded scientists and engineers;
- Ed, a history professor at American River College, whose mentors could “rock a bow tie”; and
- Ramón, an associate professor of English American literature and Latino studies at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, whose has some family history as part of his dissertation.
Jeopardy! round
PROF TALK
AROUND THE MEDITERRANEAN
WHAT DOES IT PREVENT?
ALL ON YOUR HEAD NOW
COLLEGE SPORTS
LIT CHARACTERS’ BAD CHOICES
Scores going into DJ: Ramón $3,800, Ed $8,200, Julia $1,800
DD1 – $800 – AROUND THE MEDITERRANEAN – This city can be said to be twice on the Mediterranean coast: one as a world capital, the other in Lebanon (Ed lost $1,200 from his leading score of $6,000.)
Double Jeopardy!
YIDDISH THEATER
SCIENCE VOCABULARY
STATE SONGS
DESCRIBING THE TV DRAMA
IN RECENT YEARS
SHOW ME YOUR P-H-D
Ed found all three DDs with the lead each time, scored on both in DJ and had the game wrapped up into FJ at $27,400. Julia ($5,800) and Ramón ($1,400) were just tying to keep their wild card hopes alive.
DD2 – $1,600 – YIDDISH THEATER – A surprise New York hit in 2018 was a Yiddish-language “Fiddler on the Roof”; this song becomes “Ven Ikh Bin a Rotshild” (Ed won $2,400 from his leading total of $10,600.)
DD3 – $1,200 – SCIENCE VOCABULARY – “Specific” this is the ratio of a substance’s density to that of a standard substance, often water (With a huge lead, Ed added $1,200 to his score of $26,200.)
Final Jeopardy!
1950s PUBLIC WORKS – Dubbed “The Greatest Construction Show on Earth”, when completed it connected Minnesota to Montreal
Only Ed was correct on FJ, adding $4,700 to win with $32,100. Julia dropped $2,000 to $3,800 and still remains in the running, while Ramón lost everything. Going into tomorrow’s last game of this round, all three players can advance with scores over $4,000.
Odds and Ends
Judging the writers: In a tournament featuring players with high academic credentials, the writers placed “Twilight” right alongside works of classic literature “Moby-Dick”, “Nineteen Eighty-Four”, “The Scarlet Letter” and “Pride and Prejudice”.
Generous judging dept.: For one response, Julia in quick succession first forgot the proper phrasing, then gave an incorrect response, then gave a correct response. Even though the timer on the podium had run out by the time she was finally correct, it was accepted.
Streaming struggles: The players couldn’t connect descriptions of streaming TV shows to titles “Bridgerton” and “The Great”.
Correct Qs: DD1 – What is Tripoli? DD2 – What is “If I Were a Rich Man”? DD3 – What is gravity? FJ – What is the St. Lawrence Seaway?