PORTLAND, Maine – Senior guard Imani Watkins has been named the America East Player of the Year and senior center Alyssa James has been named the Defensive Player of the Year for the third consecutive season. The announcements were made during the America East's annual Awards Banquet on Friday night, which precedes the conference tournament.

Watkins was also named first-team all-conference for the second year in a row and joined James on the All-Defensive Team. James was named second-team all-conference for the second straight season while sophomore guard Kai Moon made the third team.

With three all-conference selections, Binghamton tied Albany for the most picks among the nine teams. In addition, the two players named to the All-Defensive Team is the highest total in the America East as well as the best in Binghamton program history.

Watkins is just the second Binghamton player to be named the America East Player of the Year and the first since Sarah Cartmill in 2002. She currently leads the America East and ranks No. 24 in the nation with 20.4 points per game. Watkins was named the conference Player of the Week a program-best four times this season. With 2,060 career points, she ranks first all time in Binghamton history and No. 10 in America East history.

Watkins is just the second Binghamton player to earn America East first-team honors twice during their career, joining Rachel Laws (2004 & 2005). She has now been named all-conference three times during her career, having also been second team in 2016. Watkins was also named to the America East All-Rookie Team in 2015.

James is just the second player in America East history to be named the conference's top defender three times during their career. She joins Ebone Henry of Albany, who was honored in 2011-13.
Currently, James leads the America East and ranks third in the nation with 3.45 blocks per game. In addition, she is No. 30 in the nation with 10.0 rebounds per game – the best average by an America East player in six years. Offensively, James is the Bearcats' third-leading scorer with 10.1 points per game.

Like Watkins, James has also been named all-conference three straight years. She was named to the third team in 2016. James came to Binghamton from Caldwell University following her freshman season and sat out the 2014-15 in accordance with NCAA rules for transfer players.

Moon, meanwhile, is just one of four underclassmen (all sophomores) to be named all-conference. She ranked second on the team with 11.7 points per game, was fourth in free throw percentage (.803), seventh in assists (3.1 apg.) and ninth with 1.6 three-point field goals per game. Moon was named to the America East All-Rookie Team last year.

Binghamton is the No. 3 seed in the upcoming America East Tournament, their highest seed since 2011. The Bearcats face No. 6 Hartford in the quarterfinals on Saturday at 8:15 p.m.

NOTES: Watkins and James are just the fifth and sixth players in Binghamton program history to be named to an America East All-Conference team three times during their careers. Andrea Holmes was honored four times (2009-12) while Kate Townley (2002-04), Laws (2004-06) and Laine Kurpniece (2006-08) were chosen three times … this marks the second time in three seasons, and the third time in program history that Binghamton has had three all-conference selections (2004 and 2016 were the previous seasons) … Binghamton is now the only program in the America East to have earned all four major awards in the four years since Linda Cimino became the head coach. She was named the Coach of the Year in 2016 and current redshirt junior guard Jasmine Sina was named the 2015 Rookie of the Year.