HACKENSACK, N.J. – The Fairleigh Dickinson women's basketball team enjoyed a 50-35 halftime lead but a strong second half from Binghamton got the Bearcats the 80-69 road win on Friday night.

Binghamton (2-5) outscored the Knights 45-19 in the second half to erase the 15-point halftime deficit and win by 11. Fairleigh Dickinson (2-5) shot 24-percent in the second half after shooting 51-percent in the opening two quarters. In the first half, the Knights hit seven three-pointers and had 15 assists to seven turnovers.

"We played our best first half of the year, but in the second half you have to give Binghamton credit, in the second half they came right at us," said head coach Peter Cinella. "We missed some easy shots in the fourth quarter and had seven turnovers."

Kiana Brown led the Knights' offense with 18 points (7-of-11), six rebounds, five assists and two steals. Brianna Thomas was also in double figures with 16 points (7-of-23), six rebounds and six assists.

The Knights started the game off on a 14-6 run over the first five minutes. Four players scored during the run. Madelynn Comly capped the run with a three-pointer. Thomas got the lead to 10 (21-11) with a layup at the 2:21 mark. Amina Markovic hit a jumper to give Fairleigh Dickinson its largest lead of the opening 10 minutes at 27-11.

Fairleigh Dickinson maintained a double-digit lead throughout the second stanza. The largest lead for the Knights was 18 (34-16) when Peniel M'Bikata hit a jumper with 7:34 left in the half. Binghamton got the to 11 on a pair of occasions but the Knights lengthened the league each time and got a three-pointer from Rainey Cox with 48 seconds left to take the fifteen-point lead into the locker room.

The Bearcats scored the first seven points of the third quarter to cut the Knight lead to eight, 50-42. Eight points were the closest that the Bearcats would get in the quarter as each time the Knights would get the lead back to double digits until two free throws from Imani Watkins made a 66-58 game heading into the final quarter.

Three-pointers from Jasmine Sina and Watkins cut the lead to two, 66-64 inside the first 2:30 of the fourth. Binghamton took its first lead of the game with 6:30 left on a layup from Kai Moon at 68-66. The Bearcats would never surrender the lead over the remainder of the game.

Watkins led all scorers with 25 points, grabbed seven rebounds and added five blocks and six assists. Sina finished with 13 points and Alyssa James had 19 inside for the Bearcats.

Fairleigh Dickinson returns to action on Monday night at UMass Lowell. Tip is set for 7 p.m. and the game can be seen on ESPN3 and WatchESPN.