Princeton University employee advances to semifinals in Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions

Gilbert Collins, the five-time Jeopardy! winner from Princeton, has advanced to the semifinals in the Tournament of Champions.

Fifteen Jeopardy! top winners are competing against each other this week for a grand prize and bragging rights.

Collins faced off against Anneke Garcia and Kyle Jones on on Monday and squeezed out a win in the first of five quarter-final contests. He will face other quarterfinals winners on the game show next week.

The semifinals will be held November 11 to 13. The four losers with the highest money totals also advance as wild cards. Semi-final winners will compete in the finals Nov. 14 and 15. The first-place winner will receive a $250,000 grand prize. Second and third-place winners will receive $100,000 and $50,000.

Collins earned $84,201 on Jeopardy! in January of 2018. He had promised his two young sons he would give them one percent of his Jeopardy! winnings, figuring that if he finished second for $2,000 or third for $1,000, it would mean $20 or $10 would go to his sons.

An associate director for the Center for Health and Wellbeing at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University, Collins previously served as the Woodrow Wilson School’s Director of Graduate Student Life. The Harvard and Princeton grad was born in Germany, grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and speaks French, German, Spanish, and Mandarin. He served in the Peace Corps in Botswana.

His colleagues in Princeton will be rooting for him again next week.