The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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MAY 2025 ❱ THE WOLVERINE 29 Vladislav Goldin isn't wallowing in mis- ery, following the Wolverines' Sweet 16 NCAA Tournament exit against overall No. 1 seed Auburn. He ached for U-M's incredible turnaround season under new coach Dusty May to go on, just like the rest of them. But he's not willing to wholly sacrifice a year of achieve- ment, agonizing over a few bounces of the basketball. His athletic career has taken him from Voronezh, Russia, to Moscow, to Connecticut, Texas, Florida and now Michigan. Nobody knows exactly where it will lead next. But he's looking for- ward, and even the glances back come without regret. "Obviously, it's hard to be satisfied after you end up just winning a couple of games in March Madness, but looking back, it was a successful season," Goldin said. "We won a lot more games than last year and there was a turnaround, even after we had to regroup, after we struggled at the end of the regular sea- son. We came together and decided to fight harder, for the tournament and the Big Ten championship." They earned that championship in three gritty, highlight-filled days in In- dianapolis, after losing their final three regular-season games, two of them in Ann Arbor. At that point, nobody out- side the Michigan locker room predicted the Wolverines to hang five victories in a row prior to seeing their season end. The fact that they pulled it off allowed Goldin — the Most Outstanding Player in the Big Ten Tournament — to leave behind more tangible evidence of U-M resurgence in his one and only season in the maize and blue. "It's something you cannot take away, something not many teams accomplish," Goldin mused. "Big Ten champs — we were able to do that." It didn't stop there. The Wolverines took out UC San Diego and No. 19 Texas A&M in the NCAA Tournament, lurking one more win away from a showdown with Michigan State for a chance to go to the Final Four. Instead, Auburn wiped out a nine- point Michigan lead with 12:26 remain- ing, going on a 25-6 tear to bring on the tears. The Tigers finished off the state of Michigan one game later, sending the Spartans home as well. Goldin, his teammates and their coaches faced the hard reality of every team that doesn't find a way to win six straight in college basketball's greatest spectacle on its biggest stage. It was over. For some, like Goldin — who'd made it to the promised land of the Final Four in Florida Atlantic's unlikely 2023 run — there wouldn't be another chance. "It's always hard … you want to win it all," he said. "But I think it was a very successful season for us." TURNAROUND, WITH A TOPPER May and the Wolverines won over the Crisler crowd well before the tourna- ment games played out. An eight-win season in 2023-24 left the latter ach- ing for signs of a solid basketball future. May delivered it, bringing Goldin along with him from Florida Atlantic, and sur- rounding the big man with a host of tal- ent that eventually produced 27 wins this year. Still, it wouldn't have felt the same had the Wolverines' late-season slide con- tinued into tourney time. Some won- dered if they'd hit a wall from which they couldn't recover. Goldin insisted that doubt never pen- etrated the locker room, assuring that his team felt a run coming. "Yes, 100 percent," he said. "All the outside noise … people never see what's actually going on in the locker room. We all wanted to win the regular sea- son. We didn't need to win all the games, but we needed to win some games. Unfortunately, we couldn't do it. That made us stronger at some point, and showed us, 'OK, things didn't go the way we wanted them to.' It's not perfect. But we know our capabilities." They'd demonstrated them often dur- ing the regular season, pulling out a host of close games following disappoint- ments in some early-season cliffhanger losses. "We've been winning all season long," he noted. "We had a couple of losses by one possession. We were way better than people were talking about. We lost to Arkansas by one possession. We lost to Oklahoma by one possession. We lost to Wake Forest by one possession. We knew inside that we were able to close those ❱ Goldin "Everyone wants to make history, to leave something special behind. We won a title, and I'm happy to be part of the winning group and part of a positive motion in the future." G o l d i n w a s n a m e d t h e M o s t Outstanding Player in the Big Ten Tournament before helping lead the Wolverines to the Sweet 16 round of the NCAA Tournament. PHOTO COURTESY MICHIGAN ATHLETICS