Noah Philp scored twice, Cayden Primeau made 33 saves and the Chicago Wolves eliminated the Central Division champion Grand Rapids Griffins with a 3-2 win in Game 4 of their best-of-five series at Allstate Arena on Thursday night.
Chicago will take on the Colorado Eagles in the Western Conference Finals, with Game 1 scheduled for next Thursday in Loveland, Colo. It will be the Wolves’ seventh conference finals appearance since joining the AHL in 2001-02.
Meanwhile, Grand Rapids’ loss leaves no division champions among the AHL’s final four teams for just the second time since 1997.
Philp broke a 0-0 tie with two minutes remaining in the second period, and he added another goal 4:02 into the third. They were Philp’s first two points of the series.
Justin Robidas then netted his third goal of the series with 3:56 to play to make it 3-0, and that proved to be the game-winning tally as the Griffins scored twice late with Michal Postava off for an extra attacker. Eduards Tralmaks spoiled Primeau’s shutout bid with 2:47 remaining, and Sheldon Dries deflected in a shot from Michael Brandsegg-Nygård with 14.9 seconds to go.
Postava, who started all eight postseason games for the Griffins, turned aside 18 of 21 shots in the loss.
(Chicago wins series, 3-1)
Game 1 – Thu., May 14 – Chicago 2, GRAND RAPIDS 1
Game 2 – Sat., May 16 – Chicago 4, GRAND RAPIDS 3 (OT)
Game 3 – Tue., May 19 – Grand Rapids 4, CHICAGO 3 (OT)
Game 4 – Thu., May 21 – CHICAGO 3, Grand Rapids 2