Pendergrass attends White House invitational
Lee County District 2 Commissioner Cecil Pendergrass is more of a golf guy than a basketball fan but when he received an invitation from the White House to attend the celebration honoring the University of Florida men’s college basketball team’s national championship, he didn’t hesitate.
Pendergrass was at the White House on Wednesday helping to represent Lee County in congratulating the team that mounted a rally in the championship game against Houston to push ahead in the final minute and capture the school’s third NCAA Tournament men’s college basketball title and first under coach Todd Golden.
“It’s an honor to be here to represent Florida,” Pendergrass said on Wednesday. “I’m excited for these young men.”
“It was nice to have a great turnout from the Florida delegation,” Pendergrass said. There was about 350 people in attendance, he said. The event was supposed to be outside but due to the rain was held inside the White House.
President Trump gave the team and its coach many accolades and said they played “tough games against good teams.”
Trump said the team did “a fantastic job” and said Golden was a “great young head coach.” Trump said he would like to be Golden’s agent. He individually congratulated several members of the team by reading some of their achievements during the tournament.
Pendergrass brought his wife Jodi and three Lee County business leaders — Seagate Development Group CEO Matt Price, Mark Stevens of Stevens Construction Group and Justin Thibaut of LSI Companies. He noted that he paid for his trip on his own and didn’t use any county tax funds to support the trip.
The county commissioner said he watched this year’s championship game while he was in Tallahassee to voice opposition to a state legislature bill that will create a referendum on creating single-member districts for the county commissioners. The bill passed the state legislature and is awaiting a signature by Gov. Ron DeSantis.
This wasn’t the first trip to the White House by Pendergrass to celebrate a sports team. Pendergrass previously attended a ceremony held at the White House to honor the Boston Red Sox after one of their World Series titles.
Golden said the team, which went 36-4 this year, was a meritocracy. “We had incredible team talent. We had guys who were willing to play together, sacrifice individual stats,” Golden said. Golden presented Trump with a University of Florida jersey with the name “Trump” on the back.
The team was welcomed by Trump into the Oval Office after the ceremony, where they were each given a coin by the president.
Pendergrass was joined by other Florida politicians along with the families of the players in celebrating the championship Tuesday. Among the Florida politicians who attended were Secretary of State Marco Rubio, U.S. Senator Ashley Moody, U.S. Senator Rick Scott and U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, Rep. Jimmy Patronis and Rep. Byron Donalds.
Pendergrass said he believes he received the invitation through the White House Office of Public Affairs for his support of Trump and “my support for Florida.” He cited connections he built during Trump’s last administration when Lee County went through Hurricane Irma in 2017, as well as other connections through the Republican Party.