By CONOR NICHOLL

cnicholl@dailynews.net

Sophomore Greg Bieker and his Fort Hays State University teammates will face one of the country's best baseball teams and could play against three clubs with better records than the Tigers at the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association postseason tournament this weekend.

However, Fort Hays expects to win.

"You figure you have to go down there and if you have to go down there, then why not win it?," Bieker said after the Tigers' final regular season game Sunday. "That is kind of what everybody thinks, you are going down there to win it. Expecting nothing less than that."

The Tigers (27-28 overall, 21-15 MIAA) are the No. 4 seed in the four-team bracket. In the first round, they will face fourth-ranked Emporia State University, the regular season champions and a team that beat Fort Hays six times this spring and features the nation's second-best offense.

First pitch is scheduled for 6 p.m. Friday at the Community America Ballpark in Kansas City, Kan. Fort Hays will play at least two games in the double-elimination tournament.

The Hornets, ranked fourth by Collegiate Baseball Magazine, are 46-7 overall and 32-4 in conference play and set a MIAA record with 35 straight wins earlier this year.

Fort Hays needs to beat Emporia State and win the tournament to earn an automatic bid to the NCAAs.

The Tigers also need to win at least three of five games to finish with a .500 record this season. Fort Hays has not been under .500 since it went 9-33 in 1991.

"Emporia State has got us more than one occasion this year and it's time that needs to stop," Bieker said. "They are a quality opponent, but we, as well as we can play, we can play with them and beat them pretty easily. I think that if we put together a complete ball game, we will have a good chance at winning down there."

A complete game has yielded solid pitching and tremendous offense. The Tigers, who set a school record for homers (80), started 4-13 and 11-19 before they turned around their season.

They tallied double figures in 19 games, set a school record with 32 runs in one game against Truman State (Mo.) University and also tallied 24 versus Missouri Southern State University.

They were 24-10 when they scored six or more runs and 3-18 when they didn't. Fort Hays ranked second in the conference in runs scored behind Emporia State. The Hornets are first in homers and second in the country in batting average (.370) and second in runs per game (11.8) in the latest release of the NCAA Div. II statistics.

Junior first baseman Dusty Washburn leads the Tigers in home runs (17) and tied for the lead in RBIs (56) and is batting .387.

Bieker is hitting .404 with 13 homers and 56 RBIs. Junior Brett Becker leads the club in hitting at .405 and has seven homers and 34 RBIs.

Former Hays Lark Keith Hernandez paces Emporia State in batting at .469, with 17 homers and 72 RBIs. The Hornets have three more players hitting over .400 and senior Eric Shortall is at .380, with a team-high 20 homers and 82 RBIs.

"You have the two top hitting teams in the league and the chance for it to be a high scoring game or higher is probably pretty solid," Tiger coach Rick Sabath said. "I am not a prognosticator, but just looking at the numbers, you would assume that both teams are going to need to score some runs."

Emporia State stumbled a little in its final two conference series. The Hornets went 4-4, including a loss to Washburn University this past weekend. The losses, though, don't diminish the Hornets' talent.

Asked if the recent defeats exposed any weaknesses, Sabath laughed and said, "not really."

"They are very good," Sabath said. "You can't expect them to win every single game. It will be a tough task and a great challenge and one that we are really looking forward to."

Emporia State went 6-0 versus Fort Hays this spring and outscored the Tigers 84-32. None of the games were within five runs and the Hornets scored in double figures in all but one contest.

After four losses to Emporia State in early March, Fort Hays started winning consistently and went 15-6 before it dropped three of four to Pittsburg State University this past weekend.

"It is going to take some good baseball, the baseball that we have been playing lately," senior right-hander James Simpson said. "I think that will beat them."

Fort Hays will start junior Brian Thompson (5-4, 6.93 ERA, 5-1 since March 16) in the first game. Sophomore left-hander Matt Augustine (4-7, 5.40) will pitch Game 2, while Simpson (3-0, 4.89 ERA) would work Game 3.

Junior left-hander Eric Gilliland, second on the Tigers in starts, will move to the bullpen. Gilliland (3-4, 6.11 ERA) has made four relief appearances this spring.

"Eric has been a closer before, we just kind of feel that it gives us a really solid guy at the end of the game to go along with the other guys," Sabath said.