BANGOR, Maine - Anne Simon turned in a 26-point, 10-rebound performance as first-place Maine (20-9, 13-2 AE) held off Binghamton (12-16, 7-8 AE) in an America East women's women's basketball game on Thursday night at the Cross Insurance Center. The loss snapped the Bearcats' three-game winning streak and locked them into the No. 5 seed in the upcoming America East Tournament.

Binghamton will travel to No. 4 Bryant on Friday, March 8 in the America East quarterfinal round. The Bulldogs (15-13, 8-7 AE) clinched the higher seed with their 60-51 home victory over UMass Lowell earlier in the evening. Bryant swept both regular-season games against Binghamton.

Simon, who came into the game leading the conference with 18.4 points per contest, was 10-of-20 from the field, 3-of-6 from three-point range and 3-for-4 from the free throw line. All 10 of her rebounds came on the defensive end of the court. 

Simon's teammate Adrianna Smith, the reigning America East Player of the Year, grabbed a game-high 13 rebounds to go along with eight points and a game-high seven assists. 

For the Bearcats, redshirt sophomore guard Ella Wanzer netted a team-best 14 points while graduate student Denai Bowman added 10 points.

Wanzer was 5-for-8 from the field and 4-for-7 from three-point range.

With her 10 points, Bowman now has 1,476 points for her career. She is now tied for fifth place all-time in Binghamton program history with Kai Moon (2016-20), who reached the same total during her career. Bowman also finished with six rebounds, four assists and four steals against the Black Bears.

The Bearcats led for most of the first half but Maine closed out the second period on a 7-2 run to go up 24-19 at the break. Smith and Simon scored all of the Black Bears' points during that stretch.

Maine then started the third period with eight straight points in the opening 2:26, padding its lead to 32-19. Binghamton, however, reeled off the next 11 points in a stretch of 3:59, closing the deficit to 32-30.

From there the Black Bears went on a 14-2 run in a span of 3:41 to go up 46-32 at the end of the third period. Binghamton outscored Maine 19-11 during the final period but by then, Maine had the separation it needed to hang on for the win. 

Freshman forward Kendall Bennett scored eight points off the bench while junior forward Genevieve Coleman finished with six points and six rebounds. Redshirt sophomore guard Jadyn Weltz, meanwhile, filled up the stat sheet with seven points, five rebounds, four assists and a game-high five steals.

Maine out-rebounded Binghamton 46-28 but the Bearcats held a 24-20 advantage in points in the paint. At the free throw line, the Black Bears shot 14-of-20 (70 percent) while Binghamton was just 5-of-12 (41 percent).

Binghamton dished out 13 assists and turned the ball jover ust 10 times.

The Bearcats' game on Saturday at New Hampshire tips off at 1 p.m.