After winning 74 straight "Jeopardy!" games and becoming a household name last year, Ken Jennings is now 0 for his last 2 on the show.

The man who until Wednesday (May 25) was the winningest game-show contestant in history ceded that crown to Brad Rutter, a 27-year-old Pennsylvanian who defeated Jennings and Jerome Vered in the "Jeopardy!" Ultimate Tournament of Champions. For his efforts, Rutter walks away with $2 million.

That sum, added to the more than $1.2 million he won in previous appearances on the show, makes Rutter the all-time game-show money leader. Jennings, who got $500,000 for his second-place finish on Wednesday's show, has now won just over $3 million. Third-place finisher Jerome Vered received $250,000.

"It's an honor and a privilege to have won 'Jeopardy!'s' Ultimate Tournament of Champions," Rutter says. "Meeting and playing against the biggest legends in 'Jeopardy!' history has been more of a thrill than I can describe."

Rutter, a former record store clerk who now hosts a local game show in Pennsylvania, and Vered, a writer from Los Angeles, played their way into the finals of the tournament; Jennings, based on his record-setting run, was given a bye to the last round. The trio faced off in a series of three games, with their cumulative total deciding the winner.

Rutter led at the end of each day and cemented his victory by correctly responding to the Final Jeopardy clue in the category "20th Century Americans." The answer provided was: "These names of 2 original Mercury astronauts, who orbited Earth in May 1962 & May 1963, are also occupations," and the correct question was "Who are Malcolm Scott Carpenter & Leroy Gordon Cooper?"