Eckart is at the helm of EVA for the ninth season as the Club Director.  Eckart begins her 27th season of coaching which includes division 1 college and club. 
In the eight seasons out of five national medals for EVA teams, Eckart's teams reached Nationals podium three times:

• 2025 AAU Nationals in Orlando Silver medal for EVA 16 Elite in 16 Select
• 2023 USAV Nationals in Chicago Bronze medal for EVA 14 Elite in 14 Freedom
• 2023 USAV Nationals in Chicago Bronze medal for EVA 17 Elite in 17 Freedom 

Tanja Eckart is a 2012 UA Little Rock Athletics Hall of Fame Inductee and is the only volleyball player in the school history to receive this honor.
The most recent coaching recognition for Eckart was being named American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) 2020 16’s Coach of the Year. This is a special award because it is on the national level among all clubs in the nation. Eckart won this award while leading her 2020/21 EVA 16 National Team to 22-8 season.
Coach Eckart’s college coaching experience includes seven years of Division I coaching; four years as an assistant at UALR and three years as an assistant at Florida International University.  In these roles as NCAA division I assistant, she had the opportunity to serve as a recruiter which provided her with the knowledge of what coaches are looking for in recruits to give her experience to guide players today in their recruiting process.  Along with recruiting process knowledge she has many connections with coaches currently at different levels from junior colleges to four year universities at different divisions. 

She also has 26 years of coaching club level experience (6U - 18U) at various clubs:  Little Rock Juniors, South Florida VB, Miami Elite and her own Elite Volleyball Academy. 

Alongside running Eckart VB, skills & player development trainings, clinics and camps from 2012, in the fall of 2017 Eckart formed Elite Volleyball Academy.  EVA in its inaugural season had three teams (12's, 14's and 15's). All three teams enjoyed a lot of success which Eckart contributes to the coaching philosophy and principles implemented to create hard-working and positive environment paired with quality of training and knowledgeable coaches provided at EVA. In the second season EVA served seven teams and the biggest success was achieved by EVA 15 National team lead by Eckart as they reached their goal and qualified for the Junior National Championship in Indianapolis. EVA looks to continue to grow slowly and methodically to continue to be the leader in quality of service provided. In 2020/21 season Eckart's EVA 16 National team won ASICS Show Me national qualifier and earned a bid for 16 USA for USA National Championship held in Las Vegas. That was a huge achievement as it was the first time that team from central Arkansas won a national qualifier in USA division. 
Each year EVA teams continue to have success on local, regional, and national level which is attributed to the core values and core principles established by Eckart in 2017 and upheld each year as the club grew in size but remained quality centered. 

Coach Eckart has over 20 years of experience coaching summer volleyball camps at various universities across the nation including UALR, FIU, the University of Florida, the University of Miami and Miami Dade College.  Additionally, she has 20 years of experience of personally organizing and running camps including three years of university camps at FIU as well as eight years of experience running “Eckart VB Camps” which include Little Spikers, Pass.Set.Hit., Volley Jams, and Elite VB Camps.  Upon her return from Miami to Little Rock in 2012, coach Eckart saw the need for beginners' volleyball programs and started and lead Future Stars for five years. Since its inception in 2013, the program has had much success exposing hundreds of young players, ages 7-12, to the wonderful sport of volleyball and changing the culture in central AR of when young players get involved in volleyball.  For many players it used to mean 7th grade when they had an opportunity to play on a school team, but with program like Future Starts players had a way of learning the skill and the game as young as 1st grade.  Consequently with beginners programs, the growth of interest in volleyball and a younger age when players got involved, many schools caught on and started offering volleyball beginning in the 5th grade.

As a player, Tanja played four years for UALR (1997-2000) and won many individual and team awards including Sun Belt Conference Freshman of the year (1997); Sun Belt Conference Player of the Year (2000); three-time All-Sun Belt Tournament Selection (1998, 1999, 2000); and was the only player in UALR school history picked four times to 1st All-Conference Team (1997, 1998, 1999, 2000).  In her four years on campus, the team had three NCAA Tournament Appearances, captured three Sun Belt Conference Tournament Titles (1997, 1998, 2000) and three Sun Belt Conference Regular Season Titles (1997, 1999, 2000).  As she finished her collegiate career she held many school records including UALR all-time leader in kills (1,710) – a record that stood for 14 years, UALR career leader in hitting attempts (4,211) – 21 years later 2nd on the career list, UALR career leader in service aces (222) – currently still holding the record and UALR career leader in digs (1,156) – currently 5th on all time list.

In 2005, Eckart was the only UALR vb player named to the All-Time Sun Belt Volleyball team as part of the league's 30th anniversary celebration. 

After graduating in 2001, she was part of the United States Professional Volleyball (USPV) league selected through tryout phase in which she was one in total of 11 players picked among 120 to play professional volleyball for USPV.  The league had four teams which were comprised of nation's top VB players and 11 picked from the tryout phase.  Tanja was drafted by Chicago Thunder and had the opportunity to practice and play among nations top players including teammates like Jennifer Kessy, 2012 USA Olympic Silver Medalist in Beach Volleyball, Penn State standouts Terri Zemaitis-Boumans and Bonnie Bremner to name just few but the league consisted of players who played for the top vb programs in the nation (USC, UCLA, Penn State, Stanford,..) and many went on to represent USA in the Olympics like Lindsey Berg in indoor and Jennifer Kessy and Nicole Branagh in beach volleyball. 

Over the years Tanja continued to participate as a player in many USA Open National Championships in various cities (Minneapolis, Phoenix, Orlando, Austin) -2007 being the most memorable as the team won gold in A division.  Over the last 10 years Eckart also played in countless sand volleyball tournaments especially while living in Miami , Florida for 8 years.  Playing sand volleyball is still today her favorite activity.

Eckart, Croatia native, graduated with a Bachelor of Business with emphasis in Management from UALR in 2001 and with a Masters in Business Administration in 2004 also from UALR.  She is married to John Eckart since July of 2004 and the couple has two sons Filip (17 yo) and Daniel (13 yo). 

Coach Paige has been with EVA since its start in 2017. She served in many coaching roles and has been promoted to EVA Assistant Club Director in the fall of 2024. She will be assisting in areas of coach mentoring, club operations, in-practice recourses, recruiting needs for EVA athletes, program planning, and more. Coach Paige Gantar is 2022 American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) 16's Club Coach of the Year! We are so extremely proud of coach Paige and all that the pours in to build EVA and all the athletes. 

Paige is in her fifth season as a Head Varsity Coach at Episcopal Collegiate School (ECS) and Lower School Physical Education teacher, seventh season as EVA Head Coach, and 14th season of coaching all together.  Paige took over ECS Varsity Volleyball in the summer of 2020 and has transformed it past the recognition. ECS Varsity finished the 2022 season as a runner up. 2021 season the Wild Cats were 3A Conference Champions while Coach Paige was named Conference Coach of the Year. Paige also received a huge recognition from AVCA by being name to the AVCA 30 Under 30 List.  
Paige has been coaching club for the last 14 seasons.  She is returning to her eighth season with EVA as the coach for the highest level team. She graduated from Mount Carmel Academy, in New Orleans, LA, where she was part of the All-Star Team in 2009. She received a full athletic scholarship to the University of Arkansas-Little Rock (2009-2011), graduating in 2012 with a bachelors in Health Science. While at UALR, Paige was named Mississippi State's All Tournament player, Memphis University's All Tournament player and attended the Sunbelt Conference tournament every year. She finished her senior year at the University of Central Arkansas (UCA) and led her team to an undefeated season (21-0) finishing as Southland Conference Champions and holding the overall highest hitting percentage as a middle blocker. She graduated from UCA with a Masters of Science in Health Science in 2015. During her time at both UALR and UCA, Paige was awarded with the Sunbelt Conference Academic Honor Roll, the Southland Academic Honor Roll, Deans List and Chancellors List.

Prior to joining EVA eights years ago, Paige was a head coach for Little Rock Juniors (10U-12); Arkansas Eagles (independent club 16s), and NOLA Volleyball (13s & 14s).  In 2018/19 season Paige was the Head coach for EVA 13 Regional team and led them to an impressive 4th overall rank in the Delta Region out of 97 teams in 13U age group. Last club season 2019/20, was cut short due to COVID-19, but Coach Paige's 13's regional team was showing incredible amount of growth and improvement in what turned out to be a short season for all. In 2020/21 season, Paige led EVA 14 National team to 46th placement at USA Junior National Championship in the National division. In 2021/22 season Paige lead 16 Elite team and won three tournaments while playing in an age group up. In the 2023/24 season, Paige led our EVA 17 Elite team in earning 1st place of the Show Me Asics National Qualifier-Liberty division.  In the 2024/25 season, Paige led our EVA 15 Elite team in earning a bronze medal at the 2025 USAV Nationals-15 Liberty. 

We are extremely proud to see coach Paige continue to excel in professional career as we see her growth over the years and how she "arrived" at a coaching philosophy that perfectly aligns with EVA culture. 

Marissa Clements joins EVA after four seasons as the Conway Juniors Volleyball Director,  where she also served as a master coach to help both coaches and players grow at all levels. She coached for CJV for the past 8 years, and stepped into the role as Club Director in 2021, helping lead the program to compete at a National level. In the last 3 years, the program earned 4 GJNC Bids, two at National level qualifiers, accomplishing many firsts for the club! Marissa was selected for the AVCA 30 Under Thirty award in 2023 by the American Volleyball Coaches Association.

Before taking over CJV, she was the Associate Head Coach with the University of Central Arkansas volleyball program, and spent her last season there as the Director of Volleyball Operations. While coaching at UCA, she has totaled an impressive 74-28 overall record during her four-year tenure. 

She has coached at a collegiate level for 7 years, and has 11 years of club coaching experience. She has run camps and clinics all over the nation, and has invested a lot of time doing private training and developing individual player skills. She specializes in setter training, but loves helping to develop all skills and fundamentals of the game, along with game IQ and really mentoring players both on and off the court. 

Marissa, originally from Pearland, TX, played at Pearland High School and Absolute Volleyball Academy, before going on to play at the University of Central Arkansas. As a former UCA setter, Clements led the Sugar Bears from the sidelines, guiding Central Arkansas to a Southland Conference championship and appearance at the NCAA tournament in 2018. After graduating from the UCA with her Bachelor's of Science in Nutrition, Marissa played professionally in Svedala, Sweden for a season- where she was named MVP of their league tournament.  She then came back and took a position as a graduate assistant at Mississippi State, helping to lead the Bulldogs to two of the most successful seasons in program history. While at MSU- she graduated with her Master's of Science in Health Education, and is very passionate about helping people in their nutrition and overall health goals.  

As a player, Marissa Clements is one of the most highly-decorated players in Sugar Bear history- she spent four seasons as the starting setter for UCA. She started all 36 of Central Arkansas’ matches in 2010, becoming the first player in Southland Conference history to garner Freshman of the Year and Setter of the Year honors while ranking 15th in the nation with an average of 11.54 assists per set in her first season in Conway. That year, UCA won the Southland Conference with a 15-1 record. Clements was named to the All-Southland Conference Second Team during her sophomore season,  while helping guide UCA to a first place finish in the East Division of the SLC. During her junior campaign, she was a force for the Sugar Bears, leading the league and finishing third nationally with 12.42 assists per set, earning Setter of the Year, All-SLC First Team and All-SLC Tournament honors. That season, UCA won the Southland Conference regular season and tournament championships and made its first-ever appearance in the NCAA Tournament.

As one of the most successful student-athletes in UCA history, regardless of sport, Clements closed out her collegiate career in spectacular fashion, finishing 4th in the nation with 12.07 assists per set to become the first player in Southland Conference history to earn Player of the Year and Setter of the Year honors in the same season. She was also named MVP of the Southland Conference tournament, as she helped lead the Sugar Bears to a perfect 18-0 record in league play and a second-consecutive trip to the NCAA Tournament. During her four years in Conway,  Marissa set a program record for career assists with 5,466 while putting up three of the top-10 single season assist numbers in program history.  "My years of playing volleyball truly were some of the greatest experiences in my life thus far. I had the privilege to be trained by some fantastic coaches who not only helped shape me as a player, but also as a person. I got into coaching because I wanted to make a difference in player's lives both on and off the court, and really help create an environment and experience for these players like I was fortunate to have."

EVA is dedicated to coach preparation and mentoring so within our organization we offer several coaching positions: Head coaches, Assistant Coaches, Floater Coaches/Helper coaches.

Head and assistant coaches are assigned to a specific team while Floater/Helper coaches attend several teams' practices in order to learn from and be exposed to different coaches in our organization.  This benefits the coach in training as well as the team that they are helping as having more coaches in practice is always better for running smoother practices and providing valuable feedback.  

If you are interested in becoming a part of EVA coaching staff please read "How we coach at EVA" to know the expectation and contact club director, Tanja Eckart at 501-940-0608 or eckartvolleyball@gmail.com  

Congrats to EVA Coach Dani Moura on being selected to 2023 AVCA 13s Club Coach of the Year

Congratulations to EVA Coach Pagie Gantar on being selected to AVCA's 2022 16's Club Coach of the Year.

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