St. Joseph's High School Will Compete on Cable Quiz Show

Saint Joseph High School in Metuchen and The Pingry School will be facing one another on MSG Varsity's quiz show, “The Challenge”. The show, which is celebrating its 15th anniversary, showcases the best and brightest high school students from the tri-state area. The new season of the program features a first round match-up between the two schools, on Thursday, Nov. 24 at 6:30 pm.

Back for his third season as host of “The Challenge” is Jared Cotter, host of MSG Varsity’s Talent Show and a popular semi-finalist from American Idol. Cotter will serve as moderator, testing competing teams on their knowledge of history, arts and literature, current events, math, and science in front of a live studio audience.

“Each season I am blown away by the students’ intelligence and their wide array of knowledge in so many diverse categories,” said Cotter. “I’m really excited to get the season started and to see which teams are going to bring it.”

The Saint Joseph High School team is represented by Michael Ploch, Jason Hill, Alex Frey (who serves as captain of the team), Nicholas Palmieri and Frank Fritz (alternate). Edward Powers is their academic advisor.

Participating schools advance through a series of elimination rounds, with one school in each region being crowned regional champion and winning $2,500 for their school. The winning teams from each region go on to “The Challenge” Championship where they square off in a Tri-State Showdown. The school awarded the title of Tri-State Champion will receive $10,000 in prize money and each student participating in the final “Challenge” Championship game will receive $500.

“The Challenge” includes 192 high schools from the entire tri-state area — Long Island (with Nassau and Suffolk as two distinct regions), the Bronx, Brooklyn, Westchester/Lower Hudson Valley, New Jersey and Connecticut. The program airs at a new time, 6:30 pm on Thursday, Nov. 24, on MSG Varsity, Cablevision’s iO TV, Channel 14.