Jeopardy! star Hannah Wilson breaks her silence after loss to Ben Chan (2024)

JEOPARDY! contestant Hannah Wilson has broken her silence about her loss to Ben Chan.

Hannah took to social media to discuss how she felt about losing to returning champion, Ben Chan on Monday night's game.

She shared her response on a popular Jeopardy! Reddit thread: "Looks like the spiky blue shell finally caught up to me."

The star continued: "I couldn't ask for a better opponent to get utterly thrashed by! Ben was so sweet and friendly before the game and then just a complete beast on the stage."

"He's an amazing player and it's an hour to have him be the one to knock me out. Being on Jeopardy has been an incredible experience, and I cant wait to come back for the [Tourament of Champions]!"

In response, Ben dedicated a tweet to his opponents: "I do feel bad that my bad luck also was bad luck for Hannah and Wendy.

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But in the grand scheme, we were obviously all ridiculously lucky to be on Alex Trebek Stage."

HANNAH VS BEN

Hannah, a data scientist from Chicago, Illinois, had been dominatinggame after gameuntil Monday's twist episode.

She facedBen, a philosophyprofessorat St. Norbert College from Green Bay, Wisconsin, and Wendy Swanson, a retired teacher from Portland, Oregon.

Wendy was the only player of the three who wasn't a returning champion.

Hannah entered with an eight-day total of $229,801 and a lot of buzz from fans - while Ben returned after a hiatus as its second undefeated player with a three-day total of $69,001.

Seeing two returning champions instead of just one may have causedJeopardy!viewers to a Daily-Double take - that's because it very rarely happens.

Ben contracted Covid-19 while filming his first three games andJeopardy!scheduled him to return on May 15's episode soon after.

His return date unpurposefully but unfortunately led to Hannah's streak being stopped in its tracks.

The pair even were announced by Johnny Gilbert, 94, as "returning co-champions" up top.

HostMayim Bialik, 48, addressed the oddity as well: “As you heard Johnny Gilbert announce, we have returning co-champions in today’s game."

Ben didn't just beat his fellow ongoing winner but scored his fourth straight runaway - or locked game by Final Jeopardy - against the understated and intimidating Hannah.

Ben put on a big grin, his classic close-to-the-vest buzzer stance, and an absolute clinic, getting 19 clues correct and all three Daily Doubles.

Ben entered Final Jeopardy with $41,000, Hannah had $6,800 and Wendy had $4,400.

Final Jeopardy under Publications read: "The co-founder of this magazine that began in 1967 said its name comes primarily from a song title but noted a band name as well."

All three players were correct with Rolling Stone, and Ben added a tremendous $19,000 to win $60,000 (the second-highest single-day haul this season) for a four-day total of $129,001.

On Tuesday's episode, Ben remained undefeated as he added $27,999 to his overall earnings for a five-day total of $157,000.

'THEY SHOULD HAVE WAITED'

During Monday's episode, Hannah and Ben smiled each other's way and will now be inSeptember's Tournament of Champions- but fans were bothered things shook out this way for her.

One Twitter user wrote: "They should’ve waited until Hannah’s run was over until they brought Ben back. Not fair."

Another user replied: "I think is fair. They scheduled Ben’s return before Hannah came on the show and started going on a streak. Let’s try to celebrate people’s victory."

A third argued: "Disagree-consider Hannah may never have been a champ at all if Ben hadn’t taken a break."

To which a fourth agreed: "So someone else could face a buzzsaw [like Ben]?It’s totally fair."

Another user defended the show and wrote: "How is it unfair? The better player won." To which one more argued: "It wasn't fair to Hannah or Ben."

Former champion Alex Jacob wrote: "The problem is, I'm not sure what the solution is, other than not taping until the reigning champ can play. They probably don't want to disrupt the schedule, but maybe they should consider doing so in these rare cases."

"I think it's unfair when any returning champion has to play another returning champion. The format of the show is for the champ to play against two new players."

"But as I said, there's not a whole lot they can do about it."

To which one more replied: "They slotted Ben’s return long before they knew who the other champion would be that day. So it is a very fair process."

"What wouldn’t be fair is trying to 'protect' a reigning champion because you like them."

2021 Tournament of Champions winner Sam Kavanaughwrote that at least both will get another shot: "Even if it has been unintentional, I do like bringing them back after the other champ has already qualified for the ToC because the door isn't completely closed for the loser."

"(Tho I'm not sure if I'd like it all that much if I was the 3rd contestant)."

One more user argued: "I feel like they need a new process for bringing back a winner later in the season. Letting Ben loose on Hannah didn’t seem fair to the 'sitting champ.'"

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Yet one more said it was Ben technically at the disadvantage: "You could also say it was unfair to Ben to have to come back and immediately go up against someone in the midst of an 8 game winning streak."

"If they had adjusted his tape schedule to try to extend her streak THAT would actually be unfairly rigging the process."