Eli Gold, a longtime play-by-play radio commentator for Alabama football, affirmed on Wednesday a number of rumors stating he would not be returning to the position for the 2024 season, with Chris Stewart taking over.

Gold was offered the chance to continue working for the network in some capacity, but the Crimson Tide Sports Network, which hired Gold for the position, clarified some of the rationale behind the choice in a statement that was made public on Thursday.

The press release stated, “As we noted in yesterday’s release, Eli Gold has been a legendary broadcaster in a career spanning 52 years.” We came up with a plan in 2023 to have Chris Stewart call away games and Eli call home games plus Auburn. Eli’s contributions to The University of Alabama and the Crimson Tide Sports Network have been greatly appreciated, which is why we wanted him to continue to be a part of the gameday broadcast so that we could honor his broadcast career at The University of Alabama.

“However, Chris Stewart managing play-by-play for every game right now serves the interests of UA and CTSN the best. Eli was given the chance to continue contributing to the CTSN broadcast team in the upcoming years in a more restricted capacity, which included the lead broadcast role for this year’s A-Day game, following a series of discussions over time. He regrettably turned down the chance.

Eli has our undying gratitude and best wishes for all of his future pursuits. We have great anticipation for CTSN’s future and what Chris Stewart, in his new position, will bring to the broadcasts.”

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When their jump shots aren’t falling, Crimson Tide can rely on grit to win

The belief that this Alabama basketball team, led by head coach Nate Oats, “lives and dies by the three,” is widely held. That assumption took a slight knock on Wednesday night.

On Wednesday, the No. 13 Crimson Tide defeated No. 24 Florida 98-93 in overtime, and Alabama accomplished this feat without the team’s usual long-range shooting advantage.

In actuality, Alabama struggled from distance even though they shot 38% as a team this season on the second-most attempts in the country. Alabama’s shooters rebounded from a horrendous 2-for-18 three-point shooting effort in the first half, but the team still only shot 25% from distance overall.

Florida, on the other hand, converted one more 3-pointer on two fewer attempts.

The question is, how did the Tide defeat a strong Florida team that will almost certainly be dancing in March? Everything else they did was nearly perfect.

Alabama shot 80% as a team from the free-throw line, and the Tide had 10 more rebounds on the glass than the Gators, who are renowned for having a strong rebounding unit.

Despite playing a large portion of the game behind and often losing momentum right as they were about to tie the Gators, the players also never seemed to lose their composure.

The players concentrated on Alabama’s other offensive emphasis, which is shooting in the paint, rather than long shots. Alabama sure did live on the edge. Grant Nelson, who led the Tide with 22 points on the evening, put up dunk after dunk to keep the Coleman Coliseum crowd engaged in the contest.

Too often, three-point shooting teams struggle psychologically when they aren’t hitting their shots, but on Wednesday, the Tide displayed a toughness that allowed them to keep scoring, eventually take the lead, and win.

Does Alabama “live and die by the three” any more? Oats would be stupid to ignore the fact that long-distance shooting is a vital component of the offense given the caliber of shooters he has on the team.

But the Tide won’t be destroyed by bad shooting, even on a bad night. To win, they just need to keep doing what they did on Wednesday.