USC sophomore Xiaoke Ying is set to appear Thursday as a contestant on the game show “Jeopardy!” as part of the annual College Championship special. She joins 14 other students from universities across the country to compete for the grand prize of $100,000.
In order to get a place on the show, Ying, a business of cinematic arts major, first had to take an online exam in October that consisted of 50 questions.
“When I got the email that was like, ‘Oh, there's auditions for the college tournament coming up.’ I thought ‘Why not?’ It's just an online test. It didn't take very long so I thought you know, it can't hurt to try,” she said.
Based on the results from the test, Ying got invited to an in-person audition in November where she took another 50-question exam. She received a call back in January and then taped the show in February.
The two-week tournament kicked off Monday and the finals will air April 17. Thursday’s episode was taped before “Jeopardy!” ceased production in March due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
“It was happening in February so we weren’t in this whole quarantine situation. Everything [was] in-person, auditions and then taping was all in-person,” Ying said.
As far as preparation for the show, she did not study too intensely but did brush up on American history.
“One thing was I should know state capitals, presidents, and I felt like those were kind of important. But beyond that, I just kind of did what I normally did, you know, read different things that interest me.” Ying said.
Although it was a competition, Ying and the other students kept things friendly.
“We’re still really close friends. We have like crew messages. And we’re talking over Zoom, basically every week, and we’re very close now,” Ying said.
On Thursday, Ying will play against Joe Coker of Hendrix College and Beni Keown of Northwestern University in the quarterfinals. She is not allowed to disclose the results of the show until after the episode airs at 7 p.m. on ABC.