Students Finally Top Faculty in Jeopardy 2008

The third annual RWU Law Student-Faculty Jeopardy, organized by the terrific folks of the Sports and Entertainment Law Society, was held in front of a huge—and raucous—crowd in the appellate courtroom last week and the script had a last minute change: a team of 2Ls won!

1L team-front row (L to R) Clay Arnett, Jess Downing, Becky Aitchison
(back row) Matt Casey, Scott Gilmond, Jeff Basting

3L team -front row (L to R) Mike Mineau, Sally McDonald, Jonathan Kellerman
(back row) Erica Avondoglio, Ben Susman and Kevin Bransley.

Faculty team – front row (L to R) Richard Rose,
Jared Goldstein, Courtney Cahill
(back row) John Chung, Cecily Banks and Tim Kuhner.

Alex Trebek Wannabee

The first round got off to a slow start as all teams tripped up on answers and struggled to stay in the plus column.  The categories were: Language; Dogs; 2008 Summer Olympics; Libations; Kids’ Literature; and Colleges.

As has been the case every year so far, it all came down to Final Jeopardy, with the Final Jeopardy category of “State Capitals.” It was here, with the faculty holding a large but not insurmountable lead, that all teams slipped: The answer was “Which capital has the largest population” and after frenzied consultation none of the teams got it right: Phoenix.  Well, that’s not exactly accurate….the faculty team confidently (cockily?) waged a big chunk of its money and then wrote the answer “Phoenix,” but at the last minute changed to “Boston.” That hasty mistake enabled a more conservative 2L team to sneak by and become the first student team to walk off with the championship.

2L team (L to R) Paul Grocki, Kristen Hermiz, Matthew Schectman,
Jeffrey Kakish, Dean Logan, Stephanie Koopman and Arthur DeFelice

It was great fun and I have it “on information and belief” that the disappointed faculty team retreated to Jacky’s (who provided gift certificates for the winners) and plotted revenge for next year.