BOILING SPRINGS, N.C. – The Gardner-Webb Runnin' Bulldogs avenged an early season loss to Winthrop with a convincing 4-0 win in the Big South Conference quarterfinals, led by a pair of goals by Stina Kleppe and eight saves by Keely Brown.

With the win, the Runnin' Bulldogs now stand at 11-4-4 and need one more victory to tie their highest win total since the 2009 campaign. Winthrop concluded its season with an 8-9-1 record.

Gardner-Webb put together perhaps its most dominant 90 minutes of the season and never allowed the Eagles to control the pace of the contest. While Winthrop took nine shots on goal, many of them were easy stops for Brown. Brown's eight saves in the match were her second most in a single contest this season.

"We have an athletic team," said head coach Mike Varga. "We were great today and put a lot of pressure on their back line and were able to control the tempo and stop the looks that Winthrop managed. We looked at our earlier season match against Winthrop, and we knew coming in that we matched up with them well and had a good chance."

It was just 13 minutes into the match that the Runnin' Bulldogs pulled in front of the Eagles thanks to Kleppe's first of two goals in the contest.

Samuelle Grove crossed the ball to Kleppe, who converted from six yards out for her ninth goal of the season.

Grove had a nice run down the right side of the field following Kleppe's conversion, but it was saved by Winthrop's Kelly Horan.

In the 28^th minute, Winthrop committed a foul in the box, setting up a penalty kick for Kleppe, who sent it past a diving Horan to extend Gardner-Webb's lead to 2-0.

The Runnin' Bulldogs back line fended off three corner kicks over the final minutes of the first period, and Brown stopped WU's last attempt on goal of the period to send the team to the intermission with a two-goal advantage.

The Eagles had three shots on goal in the first 15 minutes of the second period, but all were saved, with Brown running back into the net to narrowly stop WU's third shot of the period from being successful.

After Brown held off the flurry of attempts by Winthrop, Maggie Mae Everett gave Gardner-Webb a commanding 3-0 lead.

Erin Shamleffer sent a long pass to Ty Snell who appeared trapped near the out of bounds line, but managed to cross the ball to Everett in the left side of the box who scored her first goal of the year.  

"I knew we needed to get the third goal," said Varga. It's a lot different game at 3-0 compared to 2-1. We were able to settle down, so it was great to score that goal and see Maggie score in her final home match."

The 'Dogs weren't done yet, however, as Jana Braun put the exclamation point on the match five minutes later.

Maddie Turlington sent the ball back to Braun, who was standing outside the 18 and fired a strike into the upper 90 for the Gardner-Webb's fourth and final goal of the match. Both of Braun's goals this season have come with less than 20 minutes remaining in the second half.

To seal the shutout victory, Brown stopped Winthrop's final three attempts of the afternoon, which all came in a span of less than three minutes.

The Runnin' Bulldogs outshot the Eagles, 15-11 and 13-9 in looks on goal. For Gardner-Webb, Kleppe and Grove each had four attempts, while Winthrop's Gabi Hull led the visitors with four shots.

In goal, the Eagles' Horan made seven stops, while Brown earned her 11^th victory of the year and recorded a shutout for the third time.

With the win, No. 2 Gardner-Webb will face the sixth seeded USC Upstate Spartans in the tournament semifinals. The Spartans upset No. 3 Longwood, 1-0, on Saturday night.

The semifinal match between the Runnin' Bulldogs and Spartans is set for 7 p.m. on Friday, November 2 at the Sportsplex in Matthews, N.C. The winner of that contest will move on to face the winner of No. 1 Radford vs. No. 4 Campbell in Sunday's championship match.