The Wichita State’s men’s basketball team will tip off its season at 2 p.m. Saturday at Charles Koch Arena against the Hawaii Pacific Sharks.

For the first time in 34 years, the Shockers enter its fall season ranked No. 10 in the Associated Press’ preseason Top-25.

The game against the Sharks is an exhibition game and will not affect the Shockers’ schedule, though head coach Gregg Marshall still expects to play with the full depth of the team.

“[The game] will be similar to the scrimmage,” Marshall said. “We’re going to play as many guys as we can without burning a possible redshirt.”

The Shockers may be one senior short during Saturday’s game, as Fred VanVleet reportedly injured his hamstring during the team’s scrimmage last Saturday.

Marshall said VanVleet is sitting out practices this week against his wishes.

“[VanVleet] wants to be in on every drill, but I try to be the voice of reason,” he said. “We need him more in January, February and March than we do right now.”

Last Saturday’s scrimmage also revealed challenges the Shockers must overcome early in the season to be effective, including handling the amount of penalty calls.

“Foul calls were an eye-opener,” Marshall said. “It’s going to take some getting used to. I don’t particularly like it, and they don’t ask my opinion. It’s going to be a slow-motion deal with a lot of free throws and a lot of depth.”

Senior Ron Baker agreed with Marshall about the speed of the game changing.

“Scrimmage was probably the slowest game of basketball I’ve ever played in my life,” Baker said. “Someone told me there were 36 fouls in the first 20 minutes of play. That’s going to take a while to get used to.”

Baker said the referees talked to the players after the scrimmage about why they called the fouls.

The team is also adapting to the reduction of the shot clock from 35 to 30 seconds. Baker said this change will help the team offensively and defensively.

“With that five seconds off, I think that’ll hurt teams that run half court sets offensively,” Baker said. “I think there will be a lot more one-on-one play toward the end of the clock.  Thirty-five to 30 seconds makes more of difference, and we’re noticing that ourselves.”

Baker’s words may reflect on his own performance during the Saturday scrimmage as the senior guard shot 0-9 from the field, despite “playing well” defensively, Marshall said.

Marshall said the Sharks are a good Division II team wanting to get stateside to play. The Hawaii Pacific team will also play the University of Missouri — Kansas City and Hawaii before entering their own Pacific West conference play.

Watch the game against the Sharks on Cox 2022 or listen on 103.7 FM radio, as well as live updates from goshockers.com and @sunflowersports on Twitter.