‘Survivor 45’ finale power rankings: The winner should be Julie Alley or Dee Valladares

It’s down to just five players on “Survivor 45” with a final immunity challenge, fire-making race, and Final Tribal Council jury vote on Wednesday’s two-hour finale determining which of them will become a new era “Survivor legend.” Among the hopefuls are three original Reba players: Julie Alley, Austin Li Coon and Dee Valladares; and two original Belo players: Jake O’Kane and Katurah Topps. Sitting on the jury so far are Kaleb Gebrewold, Kellie Nalbandian, Kendra McQuarrie, Bruce Perreault, Emily Flippen and Drew Basile. Two more will join them to help decide which of the three finalists should take home the million dollar prize.

Below are our “Survivor 45” finale power rankings on the five remaining players and what we think their chances of winning are. Next to their name is their odds to win based on our combined predictions, as of this writing. Do you agree or disagree with our assessment? Sound off in the comments below and our reality TV forum.

1. Julie Alley (12/1 odds)

Though the odds overwhelmingly predict Dee as the winner, we don’t see a stronger resume among the final five than what Julie has put together this season. While Dee has coasted through most of the merge safely shielded by the Reba alliance, Julie has had her back against the wall as the biggest social threat post-merge. As the Belo numbers dwindled, Julie emerged on everyone’s lips as the player that would beat anyone in the final because of how beloved she is as “Mama J.” Julie herself has engaged in this conversation at tribal councils by admitting to Jeff that she’s worried her votes against Kellie and Kendra will be held against her because they trusted her. That is, essentially, part of what hangs in the balance for Julie’s end game: will the jurors feel betrayed by her or will they applaud her ability to use her personality as a cover to strategically deceive?

The other thing that remains to be seen about Julie’s game is how on earth she makes it to the final at all. Dee has protected her from two votes, but if Katurah and Jake still see her as the biggest threat then they will be willing to be two of the three votes needed to send her home at the final five. If that’s how things progress, then Julie has to win the final five immunity in order to advance and then she’ll likely be put into the fire-making challenge, requiring her to do that quicker than someone else. If she gets to the final three, there’s not a strong case to be made that any of the other four played a better game.

2. Dee Valladares (23/50 odds)

It wasn’t until the final seven that Dee really stepped it up in strategy to announce herself as a contender to win. In the last two weeks, Dee has managed to dodge the attempts by Austin and Drew to oust Julie by working behind the scenes to help Julie save herself. Dee’s moves stand in stark contrast to Austin’s approach to their connection, which had been to keep Dee informed of everything which allowed her to keep Julie in the loop. In effect, Dee has chosen Julie as her number one ally while keeping Austin close in their showmance under the impression that he’s her number one. 

Aside from the last two tribal councils, Dee has played a fairly straight-forward game based on keeping the core Reba alliance together as long as possible. Her loyalty to the alliance allowed them to dominate the post-merge game, capitalizing on the cracks throughout the Belo group. The late-game moves, loyal play, and strength in individual immunity challenges will be a tough narrative for any other finalist to beat. In fact, unless Dee is sitting next to Julie at Final Tribal Council, we predict she will win in an unanimous vote.

3. Jake O’Kane (14/1 odds)
4. Austin Li Coon (6/1 odds)
5. Katurah Topps (30/1 odds)

Running on the theory that the game is Julie and Dee’s to lose, we can’t envision a scenario where any of Jake, Austin or Katurah win unless they’re the final three together. With that in mind, let’s contemplate who would have played the best game in order to make that happen.

Going into the final five, Jake and Katurah actually have the most power in the game. No one has discussed either of them as threats, meaning the three Reba players are probably all eyeing some version of the FTC that involves one or both of them. At the final five vote, it will take only one other player to combine with Jake and Katurah’s two votes to decide who goes home. Prior to the final six vote, Julie was everyone’s prime target, but she’s coming off of working with Katurah and Jake to take out Drew so that gives her a connection to continue working with them for another vote. In that same vote, Dee voted with them, but under a veil of secrecy that even blindsided Jake. That puts her at a disadvantage for working with Katurah and Jake and then is made worse by the fact that the move was a huge blindside to the jury as well, raising Dee’s threat level tremendously. The final five vote is important for these three players because it determines who goes home outright and who they leave to potentially win the final four immunity challenge and/or compete against in fire. 

Of the three, Jake has the most opportunity to impress the jury with a big move. He has an idol that he must play at the final five and if she throws it in the right direction then he could have the showy moment he’s looking to create. Does he tell Julie and/or Dee that he’s voting with them only to use the idol to blindside them? That’s the moment he needs. Even so, it’s a moment that will only stand above the rest if he’s not next to Julie or Dee at the end.

Austin mostly fumbled his play of two idols and shouldn’t have a leg to stand on in front of the jury. His biggest blunder was giving one of the idols to Julie and then that got worse when he spilled the plan to Dee and allowed her to prepare Julie to use Austin’s own idol against his and Drew’s big blindside move. He then “wasted” his other idol by playing it for himself when he wasn’t in danger – the impressive play there would have been to save Drew. In both cases, he almost single-handedly allowed Julie to slip through the cracks twice.

When it comes to Katurah, all we can say is that it will be interesting to see what narrative she crafts for herself to attempt to convince the jury to vote for her and how much of it will be about how annoying she finds Bruce.

SEE exclusive predictions: Who will win ‘Survivor’?

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