ST. DAVIDS, Pa.—Eastern Men's Basketball overcame a slow start to take a second-half lead Wednesday night against the FDU-Florham Devils, but the Eagles were unable to hold onto that lead and fell 71-59.

Eastern sophomore Caleb Knudsen collected his fourth double-double of the year, scoring a team-high 13 points while pulling down 15 rebounds.

Shaquan Turk added 11 points, and Austin Carroll contributed 10 points.

FDU's Trevor Sykes carried the Devils with 23 points on 8-of-20 shooting. Sykes hit went 5-for-12 from 3-point range. He also had 10 rebounds. FDU's big man Will Green also added a double-double, finishing with 15 points and 10 rebounds. John Flete added 12 points for the Devils. 

The Devils jumped to 7-0 lead to start the game, and led 28-18 with five minutes remaining in the first half. In the remaining five minutes of the half, the Eagles held the Devils to 0-for-8 shooting from the floor and only gave up one free throw. Eastern rattled off 11 points in that span with layups from Shaquan Turk, Anthony Parenti and Malcolm Garrison, a free throw from Jimmie Willis and four free throws from Caleb Knudsen to knot the score at 29-29 at halftime.

To start the second half, the Devils' offensive woes carried over and they missed their first four shots. The Eagles were unable to capitalize this time and missed their first five field goals of the second half. Eastern scored the first points of the second half three minutes and 13 seconds into the half with a free throw by Turk that gave Eastern its first lead of the game, 30-29.

The Eagles and Devils then traded back-to-back field goals, but FDU's Sykes sank another 3-pointer to put FDU ahead 37-35 with 15:22 to play. The Devils maintained a lead the remainder of the game and pulled ahead by double-digits with seven minutes remaining.

While neither team shot particularly well, Eastern shot slightly better than FDU: 38.6 percent to 38.2 percent. However, the Devils cashed in on eight 3-pointers compared to Eastern's three to provide a big difference in the final score.

Eastern falls to 7-9 on the season and 1-4 in the Freedom Conference.

Eastern challenges DeSales University on the road Saturday at 3 p.m. 

Box Score