Chicago banishes MLQ Championship demons, gets past San Antonio

Chicago Prowl chaser Liam Zach brings down San Antonio Soldados chaser Jay Stewart.

In the quarterfinals at the 2023 MLQ Championship on Saturday afternoon, the Chicago Prowl announced to the quadball world that they not only have a different name than the Indianapolis Intensity, the previous incarnation of their franchise who were eliminated by the San Antonio Soldados in 2019 and 2021. They also have a different fate.

Chicago dispatched San Antonio in game one by a score of 155-80 and won game two by a closer margin of 140-80. Inside on Pitch One for the first game, the Prowl were paced by the aggressive transition offense and pinpoint long-range shooting of quadball carriers Ryley Andrews and Nathan Digmann, who scored 40 points in a row for Chicago during his first shift.

San Antonio responded with clutch contributions from chasers Luke Langlinais, Alyssa Villalba, and Leo Rodriguez before leading scorer Jay Stewart hit his groove around the 20-minute mark. But Stewart was mostly contained from going off by the alert beating and focused chaser defense of the Prowl. In the end, Chicago rode a timely flag runner catch from former college national champion and new seeker Tim Kwan to a comfortable victory.

Outside on Pitch Two, Chicago repeated the performance in the second game, powered by a complete start-to-finish showing from Emma Vazquez, who scored the winning goal. While the Prowl fell behind 30-20 early, they scored six straight goals in the middle portion of the game to take control. Flag runner Adil Abdalla went uncaught. Chicago advances to face the New York Titans in the next round, a team that the franchise has not met since the inaugural MLQ season in 2015.