SAINT PAUL, Minn. -- It was closing time Thursday night and the Chicago Blackhawks turned out the lights on the Minnesota Wild's season for the third straight year.

Chicago right winger Marian Hossa's short-handed empty-net goal gave the Blackhawks what appeared to be a comfortable 4-1 lead over the Minnesota Wild with 3:07 to play in Game 4 of their Western Conference semifinal series. But it proved to be the difference as the Blackhawks eliminated Minnesota for the third straight season with a dramatic 4-3 win in front of 19,163 at Xcel Energy Center.

Minnesota goals by right wingers Jason Pominville and Nino Niederreiter 51 seconds apart in the final three minutes with goaltender Devan Dubnyk pulled made it a nail biter at the end and turned Hossa's goal into the game winner.

"It may have looked a little hectic but I think our team remained calm and we did what we had to do," left winger Patrick Sharp said. "I thought we hung on to get the win and that's what good teams do."

"It turns out Hoss scored a big goal, very timely," Chicago coach Joel Quenneville said. "It got a little crazy at the end, but I thought for the most part we did a lot of really solid things."

Chicago advances to the Western Conference finals for the fifth time in seven seasons with its first series sweep since 2010.

"It's hard to describe the feeling," Minnesota coach Mike Yeo said. "Losing sucks. Obviously very, very disappointing to go down 4-0. But whenever you lose, it's usually the same feeling."

Defenseman Brent Seabrook, center Andrew Shaw and right winger Patrick Kane also scored for Chicago.

Minnesota never led a second in the entire series and Pominville said what impressed him most about the Blackhawks was, not surprisingly, the way they defended.

"They didn't give us much," he said. "Their attention to detail was good, they defended hard and made it tough on us. And we had a tough time solving the goaltender for the most part."

Goaltender Corey Crawford made 34 saves to pick up the win. Crawford, arguably the series MVP along with Kane, stopped 124 of 131 shots in the four games for a .947 save percentage.

Kane, who broke his collarbone exactly 10 weeks ago on Tuesday, added an assist and now has 104 points in 103 career postseason games while proving to be a thorn in Minnesota's side. In 14 career playoff games vs. the Wild, Kane has eight goals and seven assists.

Despite that, Kane said the series was closer than it appeared.

"You look at the series and say it was 4-0 but every game was close and it was a battle every game," he said.

Already up by a goal, the Blackhawks took a 2-0 lead early in the second period on Shaw's gritty power-play goal, his first of the postseason. Chicago center Jonathan Toews fed the puck into the low slot and under sliding Wild defenseman Nate Prosser, where Shaw retrieved it and beat Minnesota Dubnyk at 3:28.

With just four goals to its credit through three games, Minnesota appeared left for dead until Wild center Erik Haula's goal 3:13 later cut the deficit in half.

Wild left winger Matt Cooke' deflection of Minnesota defenseman Matt Dumba's shot caught Crawford up high and the puck rebounded to Haula for his first playoff point this season.

The goal marked the end of a 177:11 goalless drought for Wild forwards going back to center Mikael Granlund's tally at the 9:30 mark of the second period of Game 1.

"We had a great run and obviously that's not the way we wanted it to end," Wild left winger Thomas Vanek said. "They were tight games and their scorers scored when they needed to, timely goals.

"I think that was the difference, timely scoring."

Chicago carried a 1-0 lead into the first intermission as the Blackhawks notched the game's first goal for the fourth time this series.

Chicago defenseman Brent Seabrook received left winger Bryan Bickell's pass along the right-wing boards at the red line and carried the puck into the Minnesota zone as Wild defenseman Marco Scandella closed in. Seabrook's shot from the top of the right circle ramped up Scandella's outstretched stick blade and over Dubnyk's left shoulder for his third of the playoffs at the 10:23 mark. Dubnyk finished with 24 saves.

The Blackhawks were without defenseman Michael Rozsival for the game's final 33:33 when he suffered an apparent left leg injury when he fell awkwardly just outside his own blue line attempting to defend a rush by Vanek. After Crawford denied Vanek's resulting breakaway attempt, Rozsival had to be helped off the ice and did not return.

NOTES: The Wild twice previously faced 3-0 playoff deficits. Minnesota was swept by Anaheim in the 2003 Western Conference finals and fell 4-1 to the Ducks in the first round in 2007. ... Before Tuesday's Game 3 win, the Blackhawks had suffered seven straight Game 3 road losses. Chicago is now 2-9 as the visiting team in Game 3 during the Joel Quenneville era. ... Minnesota D Nate Prosser, who turned 29 on Thursday, was inserted into the lineup for the first time this postseason in place of veteran Wild D Jordan Leopold, who was a healthy scratch. ... Although Blackhawks LW Kris Versteeg is fully recovered from a lower-body injury, he was not in the lineup for Game 4. ... After Wild C Ryan Carter made his postseason debut in Game 3, he was replaced on the fourth line by C Erik Haula, whose only playoff action came in Game 2 of the series.