{"id":11571656,"date":"2025-07-22T11:24:29","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T15:24:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.baltimoresun.com\/?p=11571656"},"modified":"2025-07-25T09:53:26","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T13:53:26","slug":"carroll-professor-a-baltimore-trivia-whiz-makes-jeopardy-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.baltimoresun.com\/2025\/07\/22\/carroll-professor-a-baltimore-trivia-whiz-makes-jeopardy-debut\/","title":{"rendered":"Carroll professor, a Baltimore trivia whiz, makes ‘Jeopardy!’ debut"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jonathan Hugendubler will sit at The Brass Tap in Baltimore Friday \u2014 where he hosts weekly trivia nights \u2014 to watch himself as a contestant on “Jeopardy!” for the first time.<\/p>\n

An adjunct professor at McDaniel and Carroll Community colleges, Hugendubler, 33, flew to Culver City, California on May 8 to film the last episode of this season at Sony Pictures Studio. The episode is scheduled to air at 7 p.m., Friday on FOX45 WBFF.<\/p>\n

In addition to his day jobs, Hugendubler said he’s been a trivia enthusiast for about 10 years, and became a trivia host and writer for Charm City Trivia<\/a> during the pandemic.<\/p>\n

Being on the show was an “out-of-body experience” for Hugendubler, who lives in Charles Village said he’s proud to represent Baltimore on the show. He can’t disclose the results of his show until it airs, he added.<\/p>\n

“If you asked me under oath to recall the experience, I probably still wouldn’t remember about 80% of it just because of how intense it was,” he said. “It’s been a really interesting experience.”<\/p>\n

Applying contestants for Jeopardy! must first take and pass its ‘anytime test,’ which gives contestants fifteen seconds to answer each of 50 questions, according to its website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Hugendubler said it’s not disclosed to the public how well applicants must perform on this initial test to move forward with the application, but said test-takers must do “pretty well” with such a high number of applicants nationwide. If the test is passed and an applicant moves forward, Hugendubler said they must then complete another test via Zoom and participate in an interview to be considered for the show.<\/p>\n

Hugendubler was notified March 20, about six weeks before filming, that he would be participating in an episode of “Jeopardy!” this season, he said. He had to take a week off from teaching to participate on the show, which was filmed on the same day as four other episodes in the season.<\/p>\n

“It was fun,” he said. “It’s a very intense experience, because they do five episodes in one day. I was the last episode of the season, so it was like a lot of sitting and waiting.”<\/p>\n

Trivia has been one of Hugendubler’s interests since high school, he said, where he was “volunteered into a trivia competition” in his sophomore year and won. His love for trivia took flight when he was getting his master’s degree in music at Johns Hopkins University.<\/p>\n