Mar 25, 2008 - Claremont, Calif. - Chemistry major Andrew Chung ‘10 has been selected from among some of the country’s brightest college students to be a contestant on the upcoming “Jeopardy!” 2008 College Championship.

Update May 16, 2008: An enthusiastic Harvey Mudd College community filled Galileo-McAlister Hall for two nights of viewing the final rounds and saw Andrew finish as second runner-up, bringing home $25,000. Going into Final Jeopardy during Friday's final round, Andrew was out of reach of the leaders and his final answer, which brought the house down, was "Congratulations to the winner. West is best!" Afterward at HMC, the college's 1998 "Jeopardy!" college champion Andrew "Rif" Hutchings '98 congratulated HMC's "other Andrew" via video conference. President Klawe presented Chung with a certificate of appreciation for his efforts on behalf of the college. More information about the 2008 "Jeopardy!" College Championship can be found on the program's website, which hosted a video of Andrew's semi-final victory.  

Update, May 14, 2008: Andrew won his semi-final round and advances to the finals! The final two-game round will be broadcast Thursday, May 15, and Friday, May 16. The HMC website posted a special feature after his victory. Stay tuned to see if Andrew can win it all.  

Update, May 13, 2008: While he finished first runner-up in last week's quarter-final round, Andrew's dollar total earned him a spot in tonight's semi-final round. The community is invited to Galileo-Edwards to watch the broadcast, beginning at 7 p.m. Refreshments will be served. The "Jeopardy!" College Championship website lists the semi-final match-ups and has links to Chung's video and blog.  

Scheduled to taped at the University of Wisconsin’s Kohl Center April 11 and 12, the two-week competition will air nationally from May 5 through May 16. The winner will take home a grand prize of $100,000.

“'Jeopardy!' is one of my favorite TV shows, and to be one of 15 selected from all of the students who tried out is a real honor,” said Chung. “This is the first time I went to the in-person interview. I took the online test last year, but I didn’t make it to the interviews then.”

In the first week of competition, Chung and his 14 competitors will appear on one of five shows. The winners of each of these episodes, along with the next four highest scorers will go on to compete in the semi-finals in the second week. The nine semi-finalists will compete in three shows for a place in the final two-game match.

The tournament's second place winner will take home a minimum of $50,000, while third-place guarantees a minimum of $25,000. Semi-finalists receive $10,000 and players eliminated during the first week are awarded $5,000.

Chung, who is from Arleta, Calif., is the second HMC student to appear on the prestigious game show, which has received 27 Emmy awards since its debut in 1984 and been rated number one in syndication for more than 1,000 weeks.

HMC alumnus Andrew “Rif” Hutchings ‘98 was the “Jeopardy!” college champion in 1998.

“I’ll be the first to admit that having a nationally televised quiz show victory as part of your personal narrative is disproportionally impressive,” he said.

As a result of Hutching's "Jeopardy!" win, HMC created the Rif Hutchings Scholarship and Prize Fund, which is awarded annually to the top three HMC finishers in the William Lowell Putnam Mathematics Contest.

The entire "Jeopardy!" experience was a memorable one for Hutchings, whose nickname Rif stands for "Random Information Frosh"—given to him during his freshman orientation at HMC.

“It was thrilling, not just for me but for the whole community,” he shared. “We taped in Berkeley, and I was able to secure seats for a record-setting 86 friends and family, mostly Mudd students, alums and professors. Other contestants had a single row of seats; I had my own section.”

Hutchings was invited back for the "Jeopardy!" Ultimate Tournament of Champions a few years ago, and the show's contestant search team solicited his opinion on the written test given to auditioning contestants.

"I like to think that my success influenced the show's thinking about the inclusion of students from smaller and less well-known colleges," he said.