Warning: This page contains spoilers for the October 7, 2022 game of Jeopardy! — please do not scroll down if you wish to avoid being spoiled. Please note that the game airs as early as noon Eastern in some U.S. television markets.
Here’s today’s Final Jeopardy (in the category Countries of the World) for Friday, October 7, 2022 (Season 39, Game 20):
It has the most water area of any country, nearly 350,000 square miles, about 9% of its total area
(correct response beneath the contestants)
Today’s Jeopardy! contestants:
Dan Feyer, a musician & crossword editor from San Francisco, California
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Kate Matthews, a research project manager from Durham, North Carolina
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Cris Pannullo, a customer success operations manager from Ocean City, New Jersey (5-day total: $136,459)
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Andy’s Pregame Thoughts:
Cris Pannullo is now a 5-day champion. Yesterday’s game wasn’t quite as dominant as his first four; for the first time in his run, he failed to score a runaway game—runaway wins in a player’s first five games still have yet to happen in the “Sky’s the Limit” post-2003 era. Is Cris getting fatigued? (This would have been his second consecutive day in the studio.)
One of today’s challengers includes Dan Feyer. Dan is legendary in the crossword world; I would like to caution against assuming that Dan will automatically take down Cris today. I saw a very similar reaction to the news that Dan was going to be a contestant to the reaction that I saw back in 2016 when quiz bowl legend Jerry Vinokurov was going to be on the show. A number of insiders at the time had made the assumption that Jerry was going to go on a long run, when instead, it’s another now-famous Jeopardy! name who ended up winning that game: Buzzy Cohen (who, I would say, is still probably one of the most underrated of the show’s top players.)
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(Content continues below)
Correct response: What is Canada?
More information about Final Jeopardy:
(The following write-up is original content and is copyright 2022 The Jeopardy! Fan. It may not be copied without linked attribution back to this page.)
One thing that I have said dozens of times here at The Jeopardy! Fan is “Know your Canada!” — this definitely counts within that. Canada contains a significant number of very large freshwater lakes within its borders; 17 of the world’s 45 largest lakes have at least some area within Canada (A number of them, including four of the five Great Lakes, are shared with the United States).
Surprisingly, I don’t think that this fact has ever been used in Final Jeopardy! before; this feels like the sort of thing that the writers would have used in an early-season Final, but it’s not showing up in any of the collections of early-season Final Jeopardy! clues that I have seen! (One fact about Canada that will soon no longer be true: a popular Final Jeopardy! topic from back in the day is the fact that Canada used to only border one other country; once the Hans Island treaty is ratified between Canada and Denmark, Canada will have a second land border).
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Game Recap:
Jeopardy! Round:
(Categories: Plaza, Sweet!; Anagrammed Bible People; Black Business; 2022 Sports News; Lions, Tigers & Bears; “O” My)
Dan got off to a very strong start, buoyed by the fact that he got 4 $1,000 clues before the first break! Cris got the Daily Double, though, and that was enough to give Cris the lead after 30 clues today!
Statistics at the first break (15 clues):
Dan 7 correct 0 incorrect
Cris 5 correct 1 incorrect
Kate 1 correct 0 incorrect
Statistics after the Jeopardy round:
Cris 14 correct 1 incorrect
Dan 11 correct 0 incorrect
Kate 3 correct 0 incorrect
Double Jeopardy! Round:
(Categories: The Ancient World; 2-Letter Spelling Bee; Recent Literary Biography; Ecology; European Eats; Gibson Girls & Guys)
The game was still very much in the balance two-thirds of the way through the Double Jeopardy! round—and then, unfortunately, Dan ended up dropping $5,000 on a Daily Double. Cris was much less aggressive, only losing $200 two clues later on his. (I wonder if Dan will construct a crossword puzzle theme around his missed Daily Double at some point.) Scores going into Final were Cris at $25,400, Dan at $10,400, and Kate—who definitely struggled on the signalling device against two very strong players—had just $3,600.
Statistics after Double Jeopardy:
Cris 28 correct 2 incorrect
Dan 21 correct 3 incorrect
Kate 4 correct 0 incorrect
Total number of unplayed clues this season: 7 (0 today).
Cris and Dan both got Final today, and that was enough for Cris to become a 6-day champion! He returns Monday to defend.
Tonight’s Game Stats:
Looking to find out who won Jeopardy! today? Here’s the Friday, October 7, 2022 Jeopardy! by the numbers:
Scores going into Final:
Cris $25,400
Dan $10,400
Kate $3,600
Tonight’s results:
Kate $3,600 – $0 = $3,600 (What are the Phillippinnes?)
Dan $10,400 + $2,600 = $13,000 (What is Canada?)
Cris $25,400 + $221 = $25,621 (What is Canada) (6-day total: $162,080)
Scores after the Jeopardy! Round:
Cris $8,400
Dan $7,000
Kate $2,000
Opening break taken after: 15 clues
Daily Double locations:
1) LIONS, TIGERS & BEARS $800 (clue #10)
Cris 2400 +2400 (Kate 600 Dan 2600)
2) RECENT LITERARY BIOGRAPHY $800 (clue #19)
Dan 14200 -5000 (Cris 21200 Kate 3600)
3) ECOLOGY $2000 (clue #21, $4800 left on board)
Cris 23200 -200 (Kate 3600 Dan 9200)
Overall Daily Double Efficiency for this game: 64
Unplayed clues:
J! Round: None!
DJ! Round: None!
Total Left On Board: $0
Number of clues left unrevealed this season: 7 (0.35 per episode average), 0 Daily Doubles
Game Stats:
Cris $24,000 Coryat, 28 correct, 2 incorrect, 47.37% in first on buzzer (27/57), 1/1 on rebound attempts (on 2 rebound opportunities)
Dan $15,400 Coryat, 21 correct, 3 incorrect, 38.60% in first on buzzer (22/57), 1/1 on rebound attempts (on 1 rebound opportunity)
Kate $3,600 Coryat, 4 correct, 0 incorrect, 7.02% in first on buzzer (4/57), 0/0 on rebound attempts (on 3 rebound opportunities)
Combined Coryat Score: $43,000
Lach Trash: $5,600 (on 5 Triple Stumpers)
Coryat lost to incorrect responses (less double-correct responses): $5,400
Cris Pannullo, career statistics:
172 correct, 14 incorrect
15/16 on rebound attempts (on 30 rebound opportunities)
44.25% in first on buzzer (150/339)
12/14 on Daily Doubles (Net Earned: $31,900)
3/6 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: $24,633
Kate Matthews, career statistics:
4 correct, 1 incorrect
0/0 on rebound attempts (on 3 rebound opportunities)
7.02% in first on buzzer (4/57)
0/0 on Daily Doubles
0/1 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: $3,600
Dan Feyer, career statistics:
22 correct, 3 incorrect
1/1 on rebound attempts (on 1 rebound opportunity)
38.60% in first on buzzer (22/57)
0/1 on Daily Doubles (Net Earned: -$5,000)
1/1 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: $15,400
Cris Pannullo, to win:
7 games: 88.579%
8: 78.462%
9: 69.500%
10: 61.562%
11: 54.531%
Avg. streak: 13.755 games.
Today’s interviews:
Dan is a regular at the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament.
Kate has a piece of art painted by a vulture.
Cris is going to stash his winnings in his mattress.
Andy’s Thoughts:
- Tying into a recent discussion on Reddit, the contestants went 4-for-5 today in the “Black Business” category.
- Dan did play valiantly, but Cris was just too much. It’ll be interesting to see if Dan’s performance is enough for a Second Chance invitation.
- Today’s box score: October 7, 2022 Box Score.
Final Jeopardy! wagering suggestions:
(Scores: Cris $25,400 Dan $10,400 Kate $3,600)
Cris: Bet between $0 and $4,599 and enjoy win #6! (Actual bet: $221)
Kate: Bet whatever you’d like today. (Actual bet: $0)
Dan: Bet between $0 and $3,199 to guarantee 2nd place. (Actual bet: $2,600)
Contestant photo credit: jeopardy.com
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Thought Canada and went with the US.
Canada was my first instinct but then I thought about the Amazon River and went with Brazil.
Exactly my train of thought too Druid.
I got this one almost immediately. That only happens to me about once every other week.
I’ve never bothered memorizing that kind of trivia, but I have a dim recollection of reading this particular factoid somewhere, possibly an old almanac.
I was curious if this question included salt water or just fresh water?
I was thinking of Malasia.
This was easy because of the clue that the 350,000 sq. mi. of water represents only 9% (or one-eleventh) of the country’s total area. Only Canada — the second largest country in the world — has an area of 11 times 350,000 sq. mi., or about 3,850,000 sq. mi. And the two countries close to Canada in area — the U.S. and China — don’t have nearly as much water area.
In guessing Canada, that was my thinking, too. It’s why I felt the question (which I too wondered about) as to whether water between islands of island nations would count was pointless as I didn’t think any of them were nearly big enough even if encompassed ocean was included.
I also wondered if ice counts as water, but still went with Canada which is big and has both.
As the Offspring once said, “You’re gonna go far, kid.”
I thought Russia as Baikal was a recent clue as the largest lake and considered Caspian a lake.
Oh Well, or may I say O Canada!
I was just looking that up as I was recalling Baikal as deepest. It appears that different websites list “largest lakes” differently. One has Caspian Sea as largest, Lake Superior second, and Baikal 7th! One that specifies freshwater lakes has Baikal first and Superior second but says Superior “is one of the lakes of the African Great Lakes”! LOL
depends on whether you are comparing surface area or volume.
Baikal is 7th in surface area, but it is super deep which makes it 2nd in volume
The sheer size of Russia ruled it out on the percentage angle
Yeah, that was my thinking, too, except for the question of whether frozen counts or not. But that would only maybe match the percentage given, not the square miles, so still went with Canada. (I did not know the square miles of Canada but the number of square miles of California [about 164K] had come up recently and I just pictured a map of North America with Canada about 24 times the size of California and it seemed to fit 🙂.)
An easy get for this Canuck – ending the week on a winning note – 2 straight after 3 misses to start the week.
Best (Canadian) Thanksgiving/(USA) Columbus Day wishes
Happy Thanksgiving! Many of us also the day Indigenous Peoples’ Day in the USA.
My thought process, after some calculations, was “About half the size of Russia, and about 10% of it is water? Must be Canada”.
Canada having a border with Denmark will be the source of several clues, I believe.
I got Canada because my family and i went on a small mini vacation there last Thursday. The 350000 sq mile gave it away. Furthermore Quebec and montreal were really beautiful. Especially the notre Dame bascilia and the waterfront. Congrats to dan and chris getting final right today.