SHIPPENSBURG, Pa. – The No. 6-ranked West Liberty University men's basketball team had to mount a rare second-half comeback here Saturday afternoon to hand East Stroudsburg (Pa.) a 96-92 setback in the first game of the Wolf's Bus Lines Classic at Shippensburg University's Heiges Fieldhouse.

Junior guard Alex Falk scored 27 points and sophomore backcourter Cedric Harris added 22 more as Coach Jim Crutchfield's Hilltoppers stormed back from their first halftime deficit in nearly two years to hold off the upset-minded Warriors in a mutual season opener.

West Liberty led for most of the first half only to see East Stroudsburg go on a late 12-1 run to take a 49-45 advantage into the locker room at intermission.

It was the first time the Hilltoppers had trailed at the half in a regular-season contest since a Dec. 12, 2009 game at West Virginia State.

West Liberty battled back to knot the score early in the second half and the teams traded leads until the Hilltoppers finally found the range from the perimeter midway through the stanza.

After missing 15 of their first 20 attempts from beyond the 3-point arc, West Liberty drained three consecutive bonus bombs to go up 72-63 at the 10:34 mark.

The Hilltoppers pushed the margin as high as a dozen points, 84-72, on a pair of Harris free throws with 7:44 remaining but the Warriors refused to fold.

With the twin towers of preseason All-PSAC forwards Duane Johnson and Terrance King working the paint and freshman phenom Whis Grant lighting it up from the perimeter, East Stroudsburg chipped away at the deficit.

A 3-pointer by Grant closed the gap to 92-88 as the clock turned under the 2-minute mark and ESU capitalized on a West Liberty turnover to make it 92-90 on a rebound basket by Grant with 45 ticks remaining.

The Hilltoppers ran most of the time off the shot clock before Shawn Dyer knifed to the hole for a clutch layup at the 21-second mark, restoring the 4-point lead at 94-90.

East Stroudsburg opted to go for the quick two points on a Matt Tobin layup with 13 ticks remaining but West Liberty beat the press and Falk – the only returning starter from last year's 33-1 Atlantic Region championship squad – found Tim Hausfeld for the clinching layup with 4 seconds left.

Dyer finished with 13 points while Hausfeld and Nick Brown rounded out WLU's double-figure scorers with 11 and 10 points, respectively. Falk had 17 of his 27 points in the first half while Harris knocked down 15 of his 22 points after intermission.

Grant led all scorers for ESU with 30 points while Johnson (21 points, 10 rebounds) and King (18 points, 11 rebounds) each posted double-doubles in a losing cause.

West Liberty closes out the Wolf's Bus Lines Classic on Sunday with a 6 p.m. game against host Shippensburg.

GAME NOTES

X The Hilltoppers extended their regular-season win streak to 47 games, just 8 shy of the all-time NCAA Division II record of 55 games set by Bentley (Mass.) from 2006-08.

X West Liberty's last regular-season loss came in that Dec. 12, 2009 game at West Virginia State when the Yellowjackets pulled out a 117-116 decision in overtime

X West Liberty also extended its streak of consecutive games with a 3-point field goal to 407 games, dating all the way back to the 1996-97 season

X Crutchfield is now 8-0 as a head coach in regular-season openers