CHILLIWACK, B.C. -- It took a little longer than they would have liked, but the Tri-City Americans finally put an end to their first-round Western Conference playoff series with Chilliwack.
Drew Owsley finished with 33 saves and four different players scored goals as the Americans skated away with a 4-1 victory before an announced crowd of 3,757 on Sunday at Prospera Centre.
"It was a good series," said Tri-City coach Jim Hiller. "It didn't surprise us it was as hard as it was. It was good hockey for six games. It has been an intense 10 days. Now it's time to take a breath and get ready for the next pressure cooker."
Tri-City won the series 4-2 to advance to the Western Conference semifinals, which begin Friday at Toyota Center.
The Americans, the top seed from the Western Conference, will have to wait until the completion of today's Everett-Kelowna series to find out who they will play in the second round.
Should No. 5 seed Kelowna beat No. 3 Everett, the Americans would play the Rockets. If Everett should win, the Americans would play Vancouver, which swept Kamloops.
Chilliwack needed to win to send the series to Game 7 but didn't have enough steam left to hold off the Americans.
"This was a tough series," said Bruins coach Marc Habscheid. "You have to expend everything, and we left everything on the ice. It seemed like the guys were spent -- we didn't have that little extra bit. The last five games took a lot out of them physically and emotionally."
Tri-City led 2-1 after the second period and took a 3-1 lead early in the third on a Sergei Drozd goal.
But the Bruins, who had extended the series to six games after trailing in the series 2-0 and 3-1, still had plenty of fight.
"Going into the series, we were the underdog," said Chilliwack defenseman Matt Delahey. "Going into the third, we still believed we could do it. This is not what we wanted to have happen."
Unlike the last two games, the Americans did not allow the Bruins to sneak back in the game. Brooks Macek made sure of that, scoring a power-play goal with 3:25 remaining for a 4-1 lead.
"It was a good one to seal the deal," Macek said. "It's nice to win this one. They put up a fight and it was competitive to the end."
Chilliwack outshot Tri-City 18-12 in the third, but Owsley was there to turn them all away.
"I was a little shaky the last couple of games, but today I felt good from the drop of the puck," Owsley said. "They are a good team and they played us tough. The first round is always the hardest to win."
The Bruins got off to a fast start, outshooting the Americans 4-2 in the opening couple minutes. But Tri-City soon took control of the flow of the game, outshooting Chilliwack 16-2 the rest of the period and taking a 1-0 lead.
Working along the wall to the right of Chilliwack goalie Lucas Gore, Justin Feser pulled the puck out of traffic and sent it across the ice to Jarrett Toll at the left point. Toll fired the puck at Gore, who got the initial stop. But the puck ended up in the slot where Patrick Holland put it in the net at 10:56.
Trailing 1-0 after the first, the Bruins tied things up at 8:27 when Roman Horak picked up a rebound in front of Owsley and lifted the puck in the net for a power-play goal.
The Americans came right back to take a 2-1 lead.
Defenseman Eric Mestery blasted a shot from the point, but the puck got caught up in skates near the crease. Mason Wilgosh managed to slip the puck to Jordan Messier, who beat Gore backdoor at the right post at 12:55.
"To be honest, I didn't know he was there," Wilgosh said of Messier. "I was just trying to get it to the net."
