JEOPARDY!'s current champion Ben Chan has opened up about his game show appearance in a winning new video.
The Wisconsin-based philosophy professor watched back his first victory with a packed classroom of college students cheering him on.
Ben, who teaches at St. Norbert College and lives in Green Bay, is getting serious buzz from Jeopardy! fans.
He has won three games so far and $69K total since first appearing on Wednesday's episode.
All three of his wins have been runaways, meaning by Final Jeopardy he just could not be caught.
He's also found seven Daily Doubles in his three games has an average of 93 percent on correct responses.
Read more on Jeopardy!
Ben did an interview with his college [seen here] donning his Jeopardy! cap and revving up the projector for an all-out watch party for his first episode.
When he told host Ken during his Q&A that he's "happy to say I beat" fellow Wisconsinite and former Jeopardy! guest host Aaron Rodgers "at pub trivia" - when it aired the entire classroom laughed.
When he wound up winning, everyone in the room went wild.
'I STUDIED AN HOUR A DAY'
Ben said in an interview spliced in with the sweet clips of his watch party: “I hadn’t prepared for what winning or losing would feel like really.
Most read in Entertainment
In some ways, it hasn't felt real until tonight even though it was taped a few months ago."
Things aren't really real unless you can share them with other people."
"Starting in October I started studying with flashcard decks an hour a day.
It was really enjoyable because I know all of the countries in Africa but not necessarily where they are."
"That's something anyone but especially someone teaching other people should really know.
"I'd say about 75 percent of the studying was like that was making me a better person, and 25 percent was making me a better Jeopardy! player," he said with a knowing smile.
"I get nervous about logistics and there's a ton of logistics involved with taping.
"The day I taped back in January, all told it was a 10-hour day.
The gameplay was incredible and one of the most fun things I've ever done, but the downside was, like, being at the airport."
"I really respect the whole institution of Jeopardy!. I wanted to honor the institution and make my family proud.
But I also wanna give Green Bay and St. Norbert something to be proud of."
Ben did not hint how many games he'd end up winning but he appeared to have a winning cheering section back home.
'THE ABSOLUTE BEST!'
Ben received his B.A. from Swarthmore College and his Ph.D. from UCLA, per his college's Flickr profile.
He then completed a post-doc in the bioethics department of the National Institutes of Health.
He has high marks on the all-important website Rate My Professor with a 4.1/5.
One review read: "This is my second class with Ben Chan and hopefully not my last. The dude says so many funny out-of-pocket things and has so much life experience that it's just fun to listen to him talk. Dr. Chan is the absolute best."
Another wrote: "Chan is hilarious and goes out of his way to make sure his students succeed. I would recommend anyone to take him."
'CAMPUS IS BUZZING ABOUT HIM!'
Ben - whose soft-spoken nature was a winning contrast to his podium signature (BEN!) - has clearly come to play.
His first win was $17,000 - which would have been higher barring a gutsy $7000 Daily Double bet - his second win was a round $30,000, his third $23K.
Even Ken Jennings, 48, had to remark that Ben’s score during his debut was “all the more impressive given your big Daily Double wager in the first round.”
One fan wrote on Reddit: “WHAT a performance from my man Ben. Takes a huge loss on the first Daily Double, goes on to dominate the rest of the game, and wins in a runaway. A tour de force performance."
Another simply wrote: "Loved Ben. What a legend."
A third recently wrote: "I find it humorous that Ben seems to ring in at times without having the answer on the tip of his tongue. Then he'll think for a couple of seconds before blurting it out just before the buzzer."
A fourth person predicted: "I think Ben can become a super-champ."
A fifth person wrote in the thread: "Dude teaches at my College, campus is buzzing about him right now."
A "super-champion" entails winning 10 games, which has not happened since the gentlemanly Ray LaLonde's 13-day streak in January.
Some critics have joked about Ben's buzzer stance on Twitter since the ongoing winner holds his buzzer close to the vest quite literally.
Read More on The US Sun
He clapped back tweeting an image of him clutching his signaling device: "As the old saying goes, 'show the buzzer kindness and the buzzer will respond in kind.'"
His Twitter bio reads: "Jeopardy April 12 2023 - ???"
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7tbTEZqqupl6YvK57xKernqqklravucSnq2hvaGyCeX%2BWaKGep6CWv6XFjJucp2WTna6vedaipaedomLAtb7EmqJmm5%2BhuaazxGagp6yVp8OqsdZo