Sage Hill School alumna appears on ‘Jeopardy!’

An appearance on the TV game show “Jeopardy!” has been a long time coming for Sage Hill School alumna Stephanie Garrison.

She remembers that when she was in high school, her English teacher at Sage Hill, Aileen Hawkins, was on the show and won. That provided some inspiration.

Garrison, who graduated from Sage Hill in 2009, is now 31. As an actor, she’s used to the bright lights, but she got her own time to shine on Monday night’s “Jeopardy!” show.

Garrison finished in second place to Eric Ahasic, a meteorologist from Minneapolis. Ryan Long, a ride-share driver from Philadelphia who had won 16 straight games headed into Monday night’s show, placed third.

“I am really excited how it went overall,” said Garrison, who lives in Laguna Hills, in a phone interview. “Obviously I really wanted to win, but that was the kind of game that I would have wanted to lose, if I was going to lose. It was back-and-forth throughout. It was fun to watch back again even though I knew the results.”

Stephanie Garrison appeared on Monday night’s episode of “Jeopardy!”

(Courtesy of Stephanie Garrison)

Ahasic had $10,200 headed into Final Jeopardy, with Garrison at $9,200 and Long at $6,800. But only Ahasic was able to correctly answer “Castor and Pollux” to the final Jeopardy clue, “Of the Argonauts seeking the Golden Fleece, these two from the same family were from Sparta, according to Homer.”

“Generally I’m pretty OK with Greek mythology, but that question was tough,” said Garrison, who bet $6,000 and answered, “Achilles and Aeschylus.” “I knew that what I had written down was wrong, but I just felt like I needed to write something. I thought I could give a pretty good educated guess, but I didn’t start writing until 10 seconds left or something.”

Garrison said she taped the episode in mid-April. She answered 14 questions correctly and five incorrectly, and was a bit unlucky as she wasn’t able to find any of the three Daily Doubles.

Still, she said it was an unforgettable experience.

“Stepping onto the stage for the first time was absolutely surreal,” she said. “It’s a lot smaller than you think it is. The crew and everybody behind the scenes, they love the show so much ... they really want you to do well and have the best experience. I think I did have the best experience.”

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