I recruited 3 Jeopardy! players from Vancouver to form the city’s greatest pub trivia team — and lost

Every weekday night in Metro Vancouver, hundreds of people gather at different pubs to test their wits in a game of pub trivia.  

Most don’t win — but on a recent Wednesday, I was feeling pretty confident about the team I put together. 

A musician and educator from North Vancouver, Caitlin Hayes. A graphic designer from Vancouver, Tessa Matsuzaki. And a communications manager from New Westminster, Chelsea Watt. 

Those are their names. But it’s also how they were introduced to millions of people around the world the last 18 months as contestants on the long-running quiz show Jeopardy!

As the three most recent contestants from Metro Vancouver that I knew of, I thought it would be fun to gather them together so they could talk about their experience. I thought it would be fun to learn some of their secrets. 

And I thought it would be fun for our team — called “Three Queens and a McBarge” — to win at pub trivia.

Only two of those things ended up happening. 

Study your states

All three of the contestants went through a similar routine before going on Jeopardy!: they did the online test (where you typically have to score at least 35 out of 50 to move on), completed an on-camera audition, and then had their name drawn from a smaller potential contestant pool. 

“They were like, ‘Can you be here in three weeks?’ So the amount of preparation time was minimal,” said Matsuzaki. 

For each of them, that meant a focus on American-centred topics that had a finite number, like state capitals or presidents — but also an understanding that there was only so much cramming they could do. 

“I can memorize a list, but there are things that come up on Jeopardy! that are just not my thing,” said Watt. 

But if there’s one studying regret they do have, it’s one that casual Jeopardy! viewers might not think about: buzzer technique. 

“It was totally my nemesis the entire time,” said Matsuzaki.

Buzz in too early, and you’re locked out from answering for the first half second or so. Buzz in too late, and chances are someone equally as smart has already gotten in. 

“It’s so hard,” said Hayes. “I never really got the hang of it … it was so hit and miss.” 

Buzz when you have to   

All three said their goal heading into their game wasn’t to win — just to make it to Final Jeopardy! (which requires a positive score), and to not screw up a question about Canada. 

But when the game begins, the competitive instincts kick in.

“I tried to tell myself that I didn’t care about winning, but I really, really did. And it really, really sucked when I didn’t,” said Matsuzaki.

More than a year later, she still thinks about her final question in Double Jeopardy!

“St. Francisco Marto, one of three children who saw the Virgin Mary in this Portuguese town in 1917, died in the flu pandemic in 1919.”

Getting it would give her the slimmest of chances of winning in Final Jeopardy! Letting it pass would mean she had no chance.

“I am not Catholic, so I did not know, but I knew I had to ring,” said Matsuzaki, who guessed Lisbon (the answer is Fátima).

“I think I’ll have to go to Portugal and go to Fátima because I am haunted.”

Wager correctly 

For Hayes, the “what if” moment was even bigger. 

“I didn’t do basic addition correctly,” she said. 

Hayes was up against Mattea Roach, a fellow Canadian who, at that point, had won nine games in a row. 

Heading into Final Jeopardy!, Roach had more than double Hayes’ score — but because there was a player in second that was closer, Roach had to wager a few thousand dollars to ensure victory. 

It meant that if both her competitors were wrong, Hayes could win, assuming she bet enough. 

She didn’t. 

“I was sort of in a daze,” said Hayes. 

“And then I burst into tears when I left the building. I did great until I didn’t. And then it was over. I can’t be on again. Not allowed to go on again.”

Joining the nerdiest secret society

Watt didn’t have one big “what if” moment, but she also had some anxiety in the weeks between when she filmed her episode and when it aired. 

“Far more people were excited than I expected for me. And that’s when the embarrassment kicked in for me,” she said.

“In New Westminster, at work, everyone was like, We have to do stuff with this,’ but I couldn’t tell them I lost.” 

But those conflicting feelings washed away once their games aired. Old friends came out of the woodwork to congratulate them. And new friends were made through the thousands of contestants they were now bonded with. 

“A day or two before my episode aired, people were messaging me, and they’re like, welcome to the private Facebook group [for former contestants]. And it’s wild how much everyone is so welcoming. It’s a huge community,” said Watt. 

“I’ve made some amazing friends. Like, genuinely people I could call for anything,” said Matsuzaki.

“I wish I could go back. I want to go back … it was genuinely so much fun.”

And at the end of the day, you get to have an unforgettable moment — one that only a few hundred people get each year from the 100,000 or so that apply to be on the show.

“It is a good thing to remind ourselves If we’re having a moment of ‘remember that time I messed that up?'” said Hayes.

“But all the trolls on the internet, they’ve never been on Jeopardy!” 

‘Ultimately, everyone loses’

As for our game of pub trivia?

The thing about these contests is that unlike regular Jeopardy!, knowledge of music counts for a lot more — in our case, 40 per cent of the points.  

We drew a blank when a Ludacris and Selena Gomez song came up. And when the points were tallied, Three Queens and a McBarge finished one point short. 

(For the record, we can’t blame having any potent potables)

“I’m so good at coming in second,” laughed Hayes.

After we turned the cameras off, someone from the winning team came up to us. 

Turns out, their dad was on Jeopardy! way back in the 1980s. He was close until the end of Double Jeopardy, where he got a Daily Double. 

He says his dad got it wrong — and still talks about it to this day. 

“It’s a shared experience that we joke a lot about. Ultimately, everyone loses,” said Matsuzaki.

“It was a blast, it was. I had a great time. It was so fun. It’s crazy to say that I was on Jeopardy!” said Hayes.

“But, like, do I still think about it every day? Yes, I do.”