In what’s become one of Binghamton volleyball’s most heated rivalries, Morgan Sweany and the Stony Brook Seawolves got the best of the Bearcats (10-13, 3-1 AE) this time around.

An incendiary video posted on Stony Brook’s Web site last spring featured a handful of Seawolves proclaiming, ‘You Gotta Beat Binghamton’ ‘ and on the strength of their star senior’s 26 kills and .404 hitting percentage, SBU (14-7, 2-1 AE) did just that, handing Binghamton its first conference loss of the season on Sunday. The 3-1 loss also snapped an overall four-game winning streak.

‘We didn’t play overly well,’ head coach Glenn Kiriyama said in a press release. ‘We just couldn’t put the ball away when we needed to.’

Overall, the Bearcats have won six of eight against rival SBU since 2004, including a 3-1 victory in the 2005 Championship game at Albany.

From 2001 to 2003, BU went just 1-4 against their SUNY counterparts, but the story has been different since the 2004 arrival of current seniors Jacki Kane and Kathleen Schauer.

‘Everyone we’re going to play is going to be hard,’ said Kane, whose career crescendo has mirrored that of Sweany since day one.

In 2004 both players make the America East All-Rookie team. Then, in 2005, Sweany led the league with 4.28 kills per game, while Kane was the league’s top blocker at 1.36 bpg.

Sweany, a 5-11, outside hitter from California, upped her impressive stats to 4.46 kills per game last season, also leading the league in points with 4.95 per game. She is an eight-time America East Player of the Week.

But Kane, a 6-2, don’t-take-nothing-from-no one blocker from Colorado, has almost always been the thorn in Sweany’s side ‘ at least until Sunday when Stony Brook toppled the then-first-place ‘Cats, a win punctuated by a Sweany kill on the match’s final point.

On Friday night Binghamton improved to 3-0 in conference with a 3-1 victory at Hartford. Sophomore Dawn Lammert hit .579% on the night, while freshman setter Lindsey Mueller added 33 assists and 14 digs. BU held last-place Hartford to a .000 hitting percentage in the decisive fourth game.

Now a logjam has ensued at the top of the conference standings with UMBC, Albany, Binghamton and Stony Brook all tied at one loss apiece.

‘Everyone on the team knows we can play better than we did this weekend,’ Kane said. ‘We’re working hard in practice and are really hungry for next week’s games.’

Binghamton will host Albany on Monday and UMBC next Friday, with each contest starting at 7 p.m. The Great Danes are the conference’s two-time defending champions, while the Retrievers are this year’s preseason favorite. Student admission is free.

The top seed hosts the annual season-ending conference tournament. Early-season victories over the league’s top two powers could give BU a strong foothold in the race to host that tournament.

But first things first: tonight at 7 p.m., Binghamton will face another local foe ‘ Cornell, of the Ivy League, in the West Gym. The Big Red swept the Bearcats, 3-0, in the teams’ last meeting in 2005.

‘I am excited to play Cornell, they’ve always been a good team and it’ll be good competition,’ Kane said.

As for the in-state rivalry, Kane and Sweany will face off in their last-ever regular-season meeting in the West Gym on Nov. 8.