A two-year standout on the Indian Hills Volleyball team, Tamara Merseli helped put together one of the most impressive runs in program history. From 2014-15, the Warriors captured 64 wins with an .842 winning percentage behind Merseli's All-American efforts. Merseli will officially be inducted into the Indian Hills Athletics Hall of Fame on Saturday, Jan. 22 at halftime of the men's basketball game at the Hellyer Center in Ottumwa.

As a freshman in 2014, Merseli earned NJCAA All-American Honorable Mention honors after appearing in all 39 matches and led the Warriors in kills (509), kills per set (3.80), digs (439), and aces (37). Merseli became the first All-American in six years for the Indian Hills program and the first under current head coach Lyndsey Michel.

Merseli, a native of Belgrade, Serbia followed up a stellar freshman season with an unprecedented sophomore campaign that resulted in NJCAA Second-Team All-American honors. Merseli posted 460 kills to go along with 328 digs and 57 total blocks. Merseli's efforts helped the Warriors upset top-ranked Tyler Junior College (TX) during the season.

For her career at Indian Hills, Merseli totaled 969 kills, 127 total blocks, and 52 service aces while earning back-to-back NJCAA All-Region XI honors.

Merseli's talents landed her at the University of North Dakota where she made an immediate impact as the Big Sky Conference Newcomer of the Year in 2016. In her first-year in Grand Forks, Merseli was named to the All-Big Sky Conference First-Team and the Big Sky All-Tournament team. In two seasons for the Fighting Hawks, Merseli was a three-time conference player of the week and finished her career with the top two attack attempts single season records.

Merseli was nominated by the Big Sky Conference for the 2018 NCAA Women of the Year award, an honor that recognizes academic achievement, athletic excellence, community service, and leadership of a graduating female student-athlete.

Following her playing career, Merseli served as a graduate assistant coach for the University of Louisiana at Monroe Warhawks Volleyball program.

Merseli earned an Associate of Arts and Sciences degree from Indian Hills, a bachelor's degree in psychology form North Dakota, and a master's degree in psychology from Louisiana at Monroe.

Indian Hills Head Coach Lyndsey Michel on Merseli

"It is an absolute privilege to have coached a young woman of such competence and integrity. She approached everything she did on my team with an intensity that is hard to match, and this led her to being a team captain, as well as earning academic all-conference honors, and most exceptionally a two-time All-American selection during her time at Indian Hills. The best quality that Tamara possesses is her ability to light up a room with her wonderful smile and set fire to her teammates with compassion and enthusiasm.

Tamara held her teammates to exceptionally high standards, but not before she had achieved and portrayed them herself. For this reason, Tamara was a highly respected player on my team during those two seasons, not only by my coaching staff, but also her fellow teammates." 

Former North Dakota Head Coach Mark Pryor on Merseli

"Coaches say they don't have favorites, but we all do. Tamara is absolutely one of my favorite players in over 25 years of coaching. She is a fearless, selfless competitor, and she was always more concerned with her team's success than any individual award she might have received.

I had a quote that I used consistently with the media when they asked about how she was able to perform so well against players that were all seemingly much taller than her. 'Tons of coaches overlooked her because of her height. Those same coaches overlooked her heart. Their mistake.'

She was instrumental in the program going to the NCAA tournament in back-to-back years, which had never been done at North Dakota. She was really the engine that drove our program for those two years."