JUNE 9 • 2022 | 37
Alan Gerdov flips
during a floor
exercise routine.
MICHIGAN ATHLETICS
out early this year that they had
earned two of the five coveted
Team USA spots.
Armed with that knowledge,
they went on to help the U-M
men’s gymnastics team win Big
Ten regular-season and conference
meet championships and finish
third in the NCAA meet this
spring.
Wooten finished second on
high bar at the Big Ten meet and
earned a second team all-con-
ference honor. He also received
the conference’s Sportsmanship
Award.
His seventh-place finish on high
bar at the NCAA meet made him
an All-American. He also was an
All-American on high bar in 2021,
taking third in the event at the
NCAA meet.
He’s been named one of U-M’s
captains for next season.
Both Gerdov and Wooten were
named to the Academic All-Big
Ten Team this season. It was the
third time Gerdov earned that
honor.
Greg and Milla Gerdov, Alan
Gerdov’s parents, came to the U.S.
from Ukraine as religious refu-
gees.
So did Alan Gerdov’s maternal
grandmother, Holocaust survi-
vor Faina Borshchukova, who
celebrated her 84th birthday
last month. She lives with Alan
Gerdov’s parents in Lincolnshire, a
Chicago suburb.
Alan Gerdov speaks fluent
Russian. His father and grand-
mother speak fluent Russian and
Ukrainian, and “my mother can
understand Ukrainian, but she
speaks Russian fluently,
” he said.
Wooten’s parents are Victor and
Holly Wooten.
Victor Wooten, a five-time
Grammy Award winner, is a
renown bassist, songwriter and
record producer. In 2011, Rolling
Stone magazine ranked him No.
10 among the Top 10 Bassists of
All Time.
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