Warning: This page contains spoilers for the July 14, 2025, 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 Awards) for Monday, July 14, 2025 (Season 41, Game 221):
In the 50-year history of “Saturday Night Live”, he’s the only cast member to have won an Oscar—& it wasn’t for a comedy
(correct response beneath the contestants)
Today’s Jeopardy! contestants:
Paul Swain, a tutor from Vancouver, Washington
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Amanda Hopkins, an analytics manager originally from New Providence, New Jersey
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Scott Riccardi, an engineer from Somerville, New Jersey (7-day total: $182,901)
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Andy’s Pregame Thoughts:
Scott Riccardi enters today’s game as a 7-day champion; an average-sized win today would get him to the $200,000 mark, as Amanda Hopkins and Paul Swain attempt to stop him from getting there.
There are only two weeks left in the Jeopardy! season; the show goes into its usual 6-week rerun schedule on Monday, July 28. This is also a reminder that the misinformation and outrage machine known as the clickbait tabloids will want you to believe that this is unprecedented, too long, and the worst thing to ever happen, when in fact, Jeopardy! has had six weeks of reruns and 46 weeks of original programming since 1986–87, and has the longest season of any American game show. New episodes generally aren’t produced to air over this period because significantly fewer people are home to watch television at this time—the viewing audience naturally is smaller over the summer due to vacations and the extra daylight hours. (This also explains why the articles you might have seen the last couple of weeks about ratings are also deliberate misinformation on behalf of the tabloids—comparing March to June and declaring disaster is deliberate journalistic malpractice and is a wilful distortion of the statistics.)
(Content continues below)
My friends over at Geeks Who Drink have introduced a daily trivia game—Thrice! Existing to make daily clever trivia content accessible to a wide audience, it's a daily challenge that tries to get you to the answer via three separate clues. It has a shareable score functionality to challenge your friends and new questions every day will give you a new daily social ritual. You can find it at thricegame.com.
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Correct response: Who is Robert Downey, Jr.?
More information about Final Jeopardy:
(The following write-up is original content and is copyright 2025 The Jeopardy! Fan. It may not be copied without linked attribution back to this page.)
Now more than 20 years sober, Robert Downey Jr. was on Saturday Night Live in his early 20s, during what many consider to be one of the show’s worst seasons in the 1980s. He spent significant time in the 1990s and early 2000s in prison due to his drug abuse, but saw a career resurgence following his sobriety. His role as Tony Stark in the MCU earned him global recognition, and earned an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role as U.S. Atomic Energy Commission chair Lewis Strauss in Oppenheimer.
To paraphrase what author Jason K. Pargin (who many might see on TikTok or Instagram Reels) said recently, if someone told many of you 25 years ago that Robert Downey, Jr. would be alive, sober, thriving, and in 2025 be the only former SNL cast member to win an Oscar, not many would believe you.
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Game Recap & Tonight’s Game Stats:
Looking to find out who won Jeopardy! today? Here’s the Monday, July 14, 2025 Jeopardy! by the numbers, along with a recap:
Jeopardy! Round:
(Categories: The Previous World Leader; Words Of Weather; A Sticky Situation; “M”edical; Dough; Ray, Me)
Scott found the Daily Double, getting it correct and leading after 15 clues. At the first set of commercials, your scores were Scott $5,800 Paul $2,200 Amanda $1,600.
Statistics at the first break (15 clues):
Scott 5 correct 0 incorrect
Paul 4 correct 1 incorrect
Amanda 2 correct 0 incorrect
Today’s interviews:
Paul is a champion-level backgammon player.
Amanda has also been on TV in the countries of Georgia and Japan.
Scott is a big fan of arranging video game music.
Scott continued with the momentum he picked up before the break, giving 8 correct responses and taking a big lead into halftime.
Statistics after the Jeopardy round:
Scott 13 correct 0 incorrect
Amanda 6 correct 0 incorrect
Paul 7 correct 3 incorrect
Scores after the Jeopardy! Round:
Scott $9,000
Amanda $3,000
Paul $2,200
Double Jeopardy! Round:
(Categories: In The World’s Fair Host City; More Than One Meaning; Fizzy Drinks; Billboard No. 1 Hits; Name The Author; This Category Is Fire)
Paul gave it a good shot, going for a True Daily Double when he found DD2 on clue 6, but an incorrect response decided this one. Scott gave 17 correct responses, brought his Coryat over $30,000, and cruised to a runaway.
Statistics after Double Jeopardy:
Scott 30 correct 1 incorrect
Paul 14 correct 5 incorrect
Amanda 7 correct 2 incorrect
Total number of unplayed clues this season: 40 (0 today).
Scores going into Final:
Scott $34,200
Paul $3,600
Amanda -$200
Scott bet for $50,000—but was unable to come up with a correct response. Still, his 8-day total is above $200,000, and he’ll go for win #9 tomorrow.
Tonight’s results:
Amanda -$200 (By rule, did not participate in Final Jeopardy)
Paul $3,600 – $3,600 = $0 (Who is Bill Murray? <3 Blakely)
Scott $34,200 – $15,800 = $18,400 (Who is ?) (8-day total: $201,301)
Other Miscellaneous Game Statistics:
Daily Double locations:
1) WORDS OF WEATHER $800 (clue #13)
Scott 2400 +2400 (Amanda 1600 Paul 1200)
2) FIZZY DRINKS $1200 (clue #6)
Paul 3800 -3800 (Scott 15000 Amanda 3000)
3) IN THE WORLD’S FAIR HOST CITY $1600 (clue #9, $22400 left on board)
Scott 18200 +4000 (Amanda 1000 Paul 0)
Overall Daily Double Efficiency for this game: 22
Clue Selection by Row, Before Daily Doubles Found:
J! Round:
Scott 3 4 5 3 5 5 4*
Amanda 3 4 5
Paul 4 3 4
DJ! Round:
Scott 5 3 3 4 3 4*
Amanda
Paul 4 3* 5†
† – selection in same category as Daily Double
Average Row of Clue Selection, Before Daily Doubles Found:
Scott 3.92
Paul 3.83
Amanda 4.00
Unplayed clues:
J! Round: None!
DJ! Round: None!
Total Left On Board: $0
Number of clues left unrevealed this season: 40 (0.18 per episode average), 0 Daily Doubles
Game Stats:
Scott $30,200 Coryat, 30 correct, 1 incorrect, 47.37% in first on buzzer (27/57), 2/2 on rebound attempts (on 6 rebound opportunities)
Paul $7,400 Coryat, 14 correct, 5 incorrect, 31.58% in first on buzzer (18/57), 0/0 on rebound attempts (on 3 rebound opportunities)
Amanda -$200 Coryat, 7 correct, 2 incorrect, 12.28% in first on buzzer (7/57), 2/2 on rebound attempts (on 5 rebound opportunities)
Combined Coryat Score: $37,400
Lach Trash: $7,600 (on 8 Triple Stumpers)
Coryat lost to incorrect responses (less double-correct responses): $9,000
Lead Changes: 3
Times Tied: 1
Player Statistics:
Scott Riccardi, career statistics:
203 correct, 18 incorrect
13/13 on rebound attempts (on 34 rebound opportunities)
41.01% in first on buzzer (187/456)
7/13 on Daily Doubles (Net Earned: $3,600)
6/8 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: $20,975
Amanda Hopkins, career statistics:
7 correct, 2 incorrect
2/2 on rebound attempts (on 5 rebound opportunities)
12.28% in first on buzzer (7/57)
0/0 on Daily Doubles
0/0 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: -$200
Paul Swain, career statistics:
14 correct, 6 incorrect
0/0 on rebound attempts (on 3 rebound opportunities)
31.58% in first on buzzer (18/57)
0/1 on Daily Doubles (Net Earned: -$3,800)
0/1 in Final Jeopardy
Average Coryat: $7,400
Scott Riccardi, to win:
9 games: 61.787%
10: 38.176%
11: 23.588%
12: 14.574%
13: 9.005%
Avg. streak: 9.617 games.
Andy’s Thoughts:
- I can definitely see Paul getting some online heat today over the fact that he didn’t give Amanda a chance on the last clue of Double Jeopardy to get out of the hole.
- Today’s runaway game means no wagering suggestions will be posted.
- Today’s box score will be linked to when posted by the show.
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I went with Dan Ackroyd in Driving Miss Daisey…
I went with Adam Sandler, thinking maybe “Punch Drunk Love”
Ditto, Ron. [At least he WAS nominated for that role, but I also thought he might have won for My Girl, but he wasn’t even nominated for that one.]
Snowball’s chance in hell that I would have gotten this one.
Steve Martin has also won an Oscar, so this was not a one question answer.
Steve Martin has never been an SNL cast member, though.
As Lisa said elsewhere in the comments, how hard is it to do a simple Google search before assuming the show is wrong?
That’s technically true. His Oscar is honorary and not competitive.
The “winning an Oscar” part is technically true, I should clarify.
Will Forte for 2013’s “Nebraska”. Wrong:(
I would never have gotten this FJ. I stopped watching SNL after the original Not-Ready-For-Primetime players left because the show just wasn’t funny anymore.
Ya know, sometimes that is because your tastes change. However, the last original cast members (plus Bill Murray AND Lorne Michaels) left as of 1980 but many of the replacements remain faves/classics. SNL lost some of those and had a rough patch right before (corresponding with RD,Jr’s year) a transition back to the helm of Lorne Michaels, which was shortly before VCRs got widespread. So we started taping SNL and when we watched we could speed-finish any skits we didn’t like (as well as commercials) and for years we still enjoyed more skits and musical guests than we didn’t. Nowadays having no-ad Peacock is great for watching SNL and even with us being 50 years older (so a different demographic) we STILL watch a higher percentage than we skip and over the last 5 years some of it has been HILARIOUS! [I’m not saying the middle 35 years didn’t have any exceptional parts, just that I don’t remember that long period as well as I do more recently — but if it hadn’t averaged as “don’t miss” good, we wouldn’t have kept watching.]
I also said Bill Murray, because I knew he had been nominated for Lost in Translation, although I was pretty sure he didn’t win. Don’t remember Robert Downey Jr. from SNL, since I also tuned out in the early 1980s following the departure of the original cast.
Same here for not recalling that Robert Downey Jr. was ever a cast member. I also thought Bill Murray was a good guess, but for some reason could not think of his name fast enough [even though I WAS thinking “the guy in Lost in Translation”] to have time to weigh him against Dan Ackroyd.
Realized afterwards he wasn’t a cast member, and that it was golden globe not Oscar, but I went Bryan Cranston.
You guys. Eddie Murphy won BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR for Dreamgirls in 2007. Smh.
Weird, because the Academy says Alan Arkin won that award for Little Miss Sunshine that year.
I know who I’m going to trust: The Academy, and not some random commenter on the Internet.
P.S.: The Site Comment Policy basically implies that if you think the show really made such a mistake, that you’re probably the one that’s wrong, not the show.
Looked it up and it was the Golden Globe that he won for that role. A very reasonable mistake.
For the Oscars, he was nominated, but didn’t win.
Eddie Murphy did win the Golden Globe (televised), Screen Actor’s Guild award (televised), and several film critics awards for that performance, so that’s probably what left you remembering that he won an Oscar, but how hard is it to look it up before commenting?
In fact, Kassie hadn’t replied yet when I started typing and looking it up, but it didn’t take me 30 minutes, I just got interrupted.
Not only did’t I not get this Final Jeopardy, but I didn’t get the correct response to the answer clue about the Canadian Prime Minster in Previous World Leader. much to my shame especially when the office as been in the US news shows, for standing up to our president. Hecj, the only thing I know about the President of Mexico is that she is a woman, and, is of Jewish heritage. Goes to show how much attention we Americans pay attention to our neighnors.
Sometimes I watch a game where I get a decent amount of correct responses playing from home (I got 25 today, with no incorrect responses) and think “Hmm, maybe I could have been competitive with the three players”.
Today is not one of those days.
My daughter works for LaCroix. Can someone repeat the LaCroix clue (in “Fizzy Drinks”) ? Thanks!
“This brand of fizzy water originated in Wisconsin & its name rhymes with enjoy, so stop trying to sound French when you say it”
While watching the program and considering the possible response to Final, my adult son, who is very much into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, piped up with “It’s Robert Downey, Jr., Dad.” I don’t really know how long it might have taken me to come up with that but I doubt I ever would. My son is much better at pop culture (if that’s what this is considered) than I am.
I went with Eddie Murphy, but had a hunch I was wrong. The thoughts are that most were expecting Eddie to win after his wins on the previous awards shows, but he did something (what I don’t remember) that supposedly ruined his chances with the Academy. I never saw Showgirls, so I can’t comment on his performance in it.
As for Oppeneheimer, what a great movie and Robert Downey Jr. looked so different in that movie, that I didn’t even know it was him. I didn’t remember that he won an Oscar and I didn’t remember him being on SNL. When he was on, I was a kid with some pretty over-protective parents and was likely not even allowed to watch the show.
Retro congrats to Scott on win #8! Hope to see him get win #9 tomorrow night.
And yes, I found it a tad “mean” for Paul to not give Amanda a chance to play FJ.