Amy Schneider Opens Up About ‘Jeopardy!’ Success on ‘Good Morning America’ (VIDEO)

Amy Schneider on Good Morning America
Good Morning America/ABC

Reigning Jeopardy! champion Amy Schneider spoke to Good Morning America on January 24, ahead of the Monday evening show where she has the chance to break Matt Amodio‘s consecutive wins record.

The engineering manager from Oakland, California, secured her 38th win last Friday, tying Amodio for Jeopardy‘s all-time second-longest win streak. Schneider now has the opportunity to surpass the Yale Ph.D. candidate, but Amodio’s looming presence is certainly something playing on her mind.

Talking to George Stephanopoulos on Good Morning America on Monday, Schneider touched on the upcoming Tournament of Champions, where she will face off against Amodio. “I’m definitely looking forward to it; I’m also a little bit intimidated by it,” she admitted.

“When I first started [on Jeopardy!], I wasn’t sure if I might be going up against Matt Amodio, and I was really hoping I wouldn’t. And now it turns out I’m going to have to anyways,” she continued. “So it’s going to be really challenging… a lot of strong players there. But it should be a lot of fun.”

Amodio went on a 38 game winning streak last year, amassing winnings of $1,518,601, which puts him in third place on the regular-season play winnings leaderboard. Schneider is also closing in on that record, as after Friday, her total earnings now stand at $1,307,200.

When asked about the secret to her success, Schneider explained, “I’m not really sure about a lot of it; I never really expected to do this well. But I think the main secret is just being curious and spending my life learning a lot of stuff.”

While Schneider said her success was unexpected, Stephanopoulos pointed out that in high school, she was voted “Most Likely to be on Jeopardy.” Schneider laughed and said she was “good in school,” achieving good grades and winning the spelling bee. “So I did expect to be on Jeopardy and do alright,” she added, “I just never expected to do quite this well.”

Schneider beat out another Jeopardy! legend just a week ago when she surpassed James Holzhauer‘s 32-game win streak. However, she is still a way off from Ken Jennings‘ impressive 74 game run. Despite the fierce competition, current stand-in host Jennings has provided some helpful advice to Schneider.

“He’s limited in what he can tell me because he’s the host; he has to stay neutral and whatever,” told Stephanopoulos. “But the advice he gives to all of us before every game is just to relax and have fun and enjoy the moment. And that’s definitely something I’ve been trying to do.”

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