While Ken Jennings basks in the glory of being the greatest "Jeopardy!" contestant in history, another contestant appeared to suffer from a severe case of nerves on Thursday's episode of the popular game show.
Priscilla Drobes, a stay-at-home mom from New York, was visibly nervous and answered only two questions correctly, while finishing -$5,400 and failing to qualify for Final Jeopardy.
Drobes was noticeably anxious throughout the game.
"Priscilla, I think nerves got the best of you today ... You were just so nervous," host Alex Trebek commented at the end of the game.
After the episode aired, viewers, fans and former contestants reached out with some positive words for her.
"Priscilla took and passed the same #Jeopardy test and audition as every other contestant on the show. She absolutely deserved to be on that stage. Today just wasn't her day,” wrote one person.
"Priscilla from @Jeopardy tonight, if you're out there, I want you to know that you're a brave woman for putting yourself out there and I have nothing but respect for you to have stayed on that stage when I'm sure you wanted to run,” wrote another, who said she had also lost on the game show.
"Dear Priscilla. Your fellow @Jeopardy contestants love you. Anyone who says anything unkind has never been where you were,” wrote former “Jeopardy!” champion Eric Backes.
Another former contestant named Chris Jacobs, who was at the taping for Thursday’s episode, shared a story on Twitter about what took place, giving insight into how Priscilla struggled.
"You could tell Priscilla was nervous — she was shaking while giving her responses — and at a certain point, the tension builds on itself. You start trying to force things, and you just get yourself further in the hole. She was having that kind of night," she wrote.
Jacobs said Drobes appeared to be surprised when discovering she had to return to the stage at the end of the episode.
"I don’t think Priscilla knew this. The producers motioned for her to go back on-stage for the closing credits, and the body language suggested a mix of confusion (“I have to go back up there?”) and shock (“I have to go back up there???”)
Jacobs also said Trebek, who has pancreatic cancer, took Drobes aside and spoke with her after the game ended, although he couldn't hear the exchange.
"But after having watched that interaction between Alex and Priscilla — albeit at a distance — I couldn’t help but think that if a 79-year-old battling pancreatic cancer had told me there are bigger things to worry about than a bad game of Jeopardy, I would probably listen," he wrote.
