VESTAL, N.Y. – The Binghamton women's basketball team (1-5) lost 83-72 to Brown (3-3) in a non-conference women's basketball game on Sunday afternoon at Dr. Bai Lee Court at the Events Center. The game was the Bearcats' third this season against a team from the Ivy League, whose conference RPI was No. 9 last season.
 
Junior guard Imani Watkins led the Bearcats with 21 points. She also finished with six rebounds, six assists and three steals. Watkins is the first Binghamton player to record four straight 20-point games since Rachel Laws did the same from Dec. 7-30, 2004. For the season, she is averaging a conference-best 22.0 points per game.
 
In addition, Watkins now has 1,035 career points and moves into 13th place all time in program history. Against Brown she surpassed Helene Thomas (1981-85), who scored 1,018 career points, and Jen Blues (2002-06), who netted 1,019 career points. Before the game against the Bears, Watkins was honored at a pregame ceremony for scoring her 1,000th career point during the game against Sacred Heart on Wednesday.
 
The Bearcats had three other players reach double figures in scoring against Brown. Junior center Alyssa James had 13 points, redshirt sophomore guard Jasmine Sina netted 12 points and freshman guard Kai Moon chipped in 10 points.
 
The Bearcats were up 37-33 at the half against Brown. Watkins had 16 of her points during the opening 20 minutes and as a team, Binghamton shot 45 percent from the field.
 
Brown, however, outscored the Bearcats 22-10 in the third period to go up 55-47. The Bears shot 47 percent from the field while Binghamton connected on only 4 of its 18 attempts (22.2 percent) during that stretch. 
 
Binghamton got to within six points twice in the fourth period. The last instance came on a layup by James with 4:45 left to go, trimming the deficit to 67-61.
 
From there, however, Brown outscored Binghamton 8-3 over the ensuing 2:45 to take a 75-64 lead with exactly two minutes to go.
 
"I told our team afterwards that it is a long season and we are going up against some very tough non-conference opponents," head coach Linda Cimino said. "Brown came out in the second half and hit their shots. They only shot 28 percent in the first half and we knew that wouldn't hold up."
 
Shayna Mehta of Brown led all scorers with 29 points. Erika Steeves turned in an 18-point, 10-rebound, four-assist, two-block, one-steal performance. Also scoring 18 points for the Bears was Taylor Will.
 
For the Bearcats, Rebecca Carmody added six points, 10 rebounds, a pair of assists and a game-high five steals. It marked the second time this season and sixth time in her career that she has reached double figures in rebounding. The five steals also tied Carmody's career high, which she set at Canisius on Nov. 25, 2015.
 
For the game, Binghamton shot an even 40 percent, hitting on 26 of its 65 shots.
 
Binghamton travels to Fairleigh Dickinson on Friday for a 7 p.m. game.
 
NOTES: Sina drained three three-point field goals against Brown, giving her 109 for her career. She is now tied with Orla O'Reilly (2008-12) for ninth place all time in program history … the 72 points was a season high for Binghamton … James has reached double figures in three straight games, averaging 11.7 points during that stretch.