The Las Positas Women’s volleyball team will not compete for the 2026-27 season. The Hawks sophomores, including returning outside hitter Madelyn Huddleston, will have to transfer to play college ball this season or sit out a year. Athletic director James Giacomazzi confirmed the cancellation of the season. The dean over the athletics department made the decision to forgo the indoor volleyball season while the school undergoes changes.
“The pause,” Giocamazzi said, “allows us to align program planning with those changes while still supporting our current and prospective student athletes.”
Giacomazzi said Jamie Hadenfeldt — who recently took a job as director and head coach of the top 15-and-under team with the club team Red Rock Walnut Creek — remains in place as the head coach and is expected to return when play resumes in 2027. Following summer conditioning and court practices ,the season would have typically started late August and run through November. This would have been the Hawks’ 8th season. The program started back in 2018 under head coach Tracee Byrd.
The 2020 season will have been the only other suspended shutdown in the program’s history, due to the mandated effects of the Covid-19 Pandemic.
Las Positas had four freshmen who played key roles last season: Huddleston, defensive specialists Lavenda Hafoka and Annisa Marpuria, and left back Analisa Garcia. If this season was critical for their chances of transferring to four-year universities, they might have to play elsewhere.
Huddleston, who played a critical role last season and averaged 3.57 kills per set as a freshman, figured to be one of the best players in the region and a star for Las Positas. The Hawks went 13-3 during the non-conference schedule last season, including an 11-game win streak. But after finishing with a 2-8 record in the Coast Conference, they missed their chance to make the playoffs for the first time in the history of the program.
Now, they must wait another year.
Dean Michael McQuinston suspended the season as part of the school’s plans to enhance the athletic facilities on campus. The school is adding 16 pickle-ball courts and six beach volleyball courts. The new courts are expected to be finished by fall 2027.
It is unclear how adding outdoor volleyball courts calls for an indoor volleyball season to be cancelled. Nor is it clear how the same issues that prevent the volleyball season doesn’t impact the men’s and women’s basketball seasons, which plays in the same gym. McQuinston did not yet respond to interview requests before the deadline.
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TOP PHOTO: The Hawks will have to wait another year to make the playoffs for the first time in school history after the coming season was canceled. (Express Library)
Camille LeDuc is the multimedia editor. Follow her on Instagram at @bycamilleleduc.
