Mohegan — Hosannas have rained on many noteworthy last names in New London lore and legend, perhaps none more than “Lancaster,” a surname synonymous with basketball for, oh, around 50 years now.

Serenity Lancaster knows the family roster. There’s grandpa Gerry. Uncle Gerry. Aunt Clara. Cousin Rob (the late, great Rob Sanders). Cousin Mike. Cousin Troy (McKelvin). And others unintentionally omitted. Put it this way about the family: They’ve brought honor to their city for three generations, the youngest of which, Serenity, the 6-foot-1 sophomore center, had 23 points, 14 rebounds and four blocks Tuesday night as the Whaler girls won their second straight Eastern Connecticut Conference Division I title.

New London 65, Ledyard 39.

If she wears any pressure to somehow live up to her name, she’s not letting on. She’s just sprinting up and down the floor with her four other teammates, none of whom ever leave the game, on this seven-player roster.

“I don’t see it as pressure,” Lancaster said. “Not really. I know I can push to be better. I'm only a sophomore. I'm doing stuff that my cousins were doing. I don’t look at it as pressure. With big games like this, it’s there, but then it fades away after I get my first point.”

It took Lancaster a while to get that first point Tuesday, a pesky Ledyard defense surrounding her, nudging her, a poke here, a prod there. Then she scored nine points in the last three minutes of the first half. Fourteen more followed in the second half. Cue Queen and “We Are The Champions.”

Maybe the most impressive part: Neither Lancaster nor her teammates appeared tired — or were even breathing hard — despite this season-long lack of depth. Gold stars for coach Tammy Millsaps, who certainly has two A-level players in Lancaster and Nalyce Dudley, but has managed to negotiate the perils of a thin roster while playing competition throughout New England (and other places).

“Most people would say it's difficult, but it's really not. I think we play together,” Lancaster said. “And we do enough in practice where we can keep playing and playing. We don’t get tired because we run a lot in practice. So I think our stamina is up there.”

Applied mathematical skills suggest it’s impossible to play five on five in practice with seven players. So how do the Whalers do it?

“The 10 would be Cora (assistant coach Cora Sawyer), Jada (assistant coach Jada Lucas), another coach and coach Millsaps on occasion,” Lancaster said. “She's a defensive player. She’s been the point guard. Or she's just running all around and if she can do it, she's usually around the court, looking at what we need to fix.”

Lancaster caught a wry grin when someone asked her if she has perhaps swatted coach Millsaps the way she Dikembe Mutomboed a Ledyard player during Tuesday’s game. Lancaster’s block was so thunderous she even caught a grin.

“A couple of the other coaches maybe,” Lancaster said, “but never coach Millsaps.”

Fun fact from Tuesday night: The two best players in each game were sophomore centers. Lancaster and Stonington’s Rory Risley (16 points, leading the Bears to the Division II title.) There isn’t one boys’ player in the ECC that has the post moves or footwork owned by Lancaster or Risley. A purist might have wept tears of joy.

“A lot of my post moves are self taught,” Lancaster said. “My post moves come from either watching the boys play because I'm really close with SaVahn (Warren of the boys’ basketball team) or just watching others play to see what some of their post-ups look like. A lot of my uncles were guards.”

Can the Whalers win the program’s third state title? We’ll see. Sure helps to have two home-run hitters in Dudley and Lancaster, even if it’s a bit confounding as to why this elite program has but seven kids. Toughness, apparently, isn’t what it used to be.

“I don't know. I just think it’s our generation now. They don't really focus on the sports they can do,” Lancaster said. “They just … I don't know … kids our age don't really put their mind into sports. They just do whatever they want.

“I feel like if they get yelled at once they’ll quit. I think our team has played for coach Millsaps enough where we’re used to it. We're used to doing sprints. We're used to her yelling. But it's always out of the love she has for us to push us to be the best we can.”

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro