HOOD RIVER - Hood River Valley opened its 2026 Northwest Oregon Conference volleyball season with a 3-0 sweep of visiting Rex Putnam on Sept. 10.
The young Eagles (1-2 overall), with one senior on their roster, had lost two nonleague matches to start the season – by 3-0 scores. Coach Emily Curtis’ team rebounded to open its 12-match league season in an emphatic manner.
Hood River’s clinching, 25-17 set win vs. Putnam (0-4 overall) – which the Eagles led by double digit margins at times – showcased an improved passing performance. That enabled its front-line players, like sophomore 6-foot-1 Eleanor Buser, to impose her will near the net. Buser had the winning kill shot off a backset from Lyla Mall. In the middle of the set, a kill shot by Amelia Gabriel pushed HRV’s margin to 10-3 and led to a Putnam timeout.
The Eagles’ 25-11, first-set win was punctuated by the serving of Lylah Hunter. She started her jump-set serves at 14-8, and not even a Putnam timeout at 19-8 could disrupt her flow. She served until HRV had an insurmountable 23-8 advantage – with the run stopped only when Buser got a little too aggressive at the net resulting in a violation. She made up for it a short time later when she dinked the set winner into the middle of the Putnam defense off a Taylor Duckwall set.
Putnam was hampered by mistakes in the second set, a 25-19 win. HRV used an 8-2 run – which included an impressive put-away shot from Tia Britt - to pull ahead 17-11. A Buser kill made it 18-12 and an Addi Van Metre kill gave the hosts set point at 24-17. A couple of HRV errors enabled the Kingsmen to stave off set point, before the visitors hit a serve into the net to advance the match into what proved to be the final set.
HRV has league matches this week at Sandy on Sept. 15 and at Centennial on Sept. 17.
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