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Hey everyone, we’ll have a live blog of this afternoon’s game between the Maroons and the Hope College Flying Dutch—a second consecutive awesome school nickname, after the men faced the Wabash Little Giants last Saturday—starting from 3:45 p.m., with kickoff scheduled for 4:00 p.m.

You can interact with the live blog or just follow along HERE, on Twitter (@gomaroons), or contact us through email at gomaroons@gmail.com.

On paper, Wabash and Chicago have had up-and-down seasons. Wabash came in with an impressive 4-2 start and looked like a young, upstart team. Chicago, at 3-2, has shown a never-say-die attitude this year but has been hobbled by injuries.

Today, Chicago was entirely up, and Wabash … well, I can only imagine they’ve had better days. Chicago had three key players back in the starting lineup: central striker Stan Coville, and center midfielders Garrett Laird and Kenzo Manners. Their presence made all the different in connecting what had been a less-than-fluid attack without them.

Wabash’s game was more enigmatic. After yielding the early goal to Coville—a lovely finish into the far post with only the keeper to beat—a couple Wabash players already started getting on teammates for poor passes. Then, one player picked up a yellow card for dissent—on which he ultimately drew the foul. Another added a yellow for using a magic word.

Coming out of halftime, it was hard to tell whether the Wabash bench was more frustrated with the officiating or the team’s play, and only two starters (including the goalkeeper) returned to play the second half. (Will no-one think of the broadcasters?) The first-string didn’t return until the last five minutes of the game, trailing 3-1. Perhaps the youth part of their season stood out most today.

As for Chicago, this was the type of performance we were waiting for. Really, they deserve credit for having the game in their control for the entire 90 minutes, for playing as complete of a game as they have had all year. No doubt injuries had an effect early on, and the biggest positive is that they sit here today with a 4-2 record despite playing with a limited attack.

Player of the match: Coville—Two goals, one nice finish and the other a good cross-turned-shot that deflected in. He was unjustly called offsides on another run that would have produced a breakaway. He showed all the speed and vertical play that made him such a target last season. Good to have him back.

Of course, Alex Clifford deserves honors for feeding Coville so many chances. His through-balls were sublime today, as he curbed some of his own runs in order to spring Coville over and over again. In fact, Coville’s second goal was started on another long ball from midfield by Clifford, though Coville had to do a lot more work to get himself into the box and a shooting opportunity. In the end, both players could have paired up on three goals.

Third-star shoutout to Rashad Masri, who once again showed a knack for diving, leaping, falling and sliding varieties of clearances. Hard to see a way around him.

(We do stand corrected on Chicago’s second goal. We had thought it was Laird’s header off of Pikna’s corner, but instead it was an own goal. Sure had the power and direction to look like it had come off Laird’s head.)

Let’s recap some of the forwards’ accomplishments this season:

• Sarah Loh scores four goals against DePauw.
• Natalia Jovanovic picks up three assists in the same game.
• Allison Hegel matches Loh’s four with her own quadruple against Anderson. (Also, Marquel Reddish picked up a hat trick.)
• And today, Jovanovic picked up her second game-winner of her six-game career by firing a one-timed rocket to the right post off of Loh’s excellent run and feed.

There was no drop off when Hegel came in, either, as she looked deserving of a place on the scoresheet. Last year, the Great Bontz-Loh race seemed to drive Loh and Brooke Bontz to keep outdoing the other. It was awesome to watch and produced what might have been the region’s best two-headed attack. This year, it’s become a three-pronged attack, as Hegel has proved that her nose for net is for real. She’s solid all-around, which has made her a valuable contributor off the bench … and easy to underrate.

Player of the Match: Jovanovic—She hit home the game-winner and otherwise had a very good overall game. She pressured the defense with and without the ball, forced Kalamazoo to throw extra numbers at her and finished a key early chance.

Central defender Liz Doman also got heavy consideration for her stifling performance. She already has proved a valuable asset in stopping attacks before they start. Sound a little like the previous No. 10, Kaitlin Meyer?

And then, we’ll give a tie for the third star to Loh and goalkeeper Emma Gormley. Loh was a playmaker who recognized and embraced her role early, and Gormley had one big save and from there made handling the slick conditions look easy.

UPDATE: We’re back on air. Let us know you can hear us at gomaroons@gmail.com

Actually, it’s the lightning that creates a mandatory 30-minute delay. We had to disconnect our broadcast to keep the equipment dry, but keep checking twitter.com/gomaroons for up-to-the-minute updates.

No score, eighth minute of the game between Chicago and Kalamazoo.