The storyline, that the Komets couldn’t beat the Toledo Walleye in a playoff series, had a chum-like stench in these parts.

And the Komets have finally eradicated it.

A 4-2 victory tonight, in front of 6,160 fans at Memorial Coliseum, completed a six-game series victory over the rival Walleye and sent the Komets into the Western Conference finals.

Michael Houser stopped 29 shots and Gabriel Desjardins, who leads the ECHL in playoff scoring, kept up his torrid pace with the game-winning goal.

Awaiting the Komets is the Colorado Eagles, who won the Kelly Cup last season and are in their last ECHL playoff before moving to the higher-level American Hockey League. The Komets open the best-of-7 series at Loveland, Colorado, with games Saturday and Sunday in a 2-3-2 formatted series.

It’s the second time the Komets have advanced to the conference finals in the ECHL; they lost to the Allen Americans in 2016. That season, they didn’t run into Toledo, which took out Fort Wayne in seven games in 2015 and in five games last year.

After winning 6 of 8 regular-season games between the teams, things looked bleak for the Komets when they dropped Game 3 of this series, 4-3 at the Coliseum on May 2. But they won three straight games after that in taking out a Walleye team that had won the Central Division’s regular-season championship.

What could have been an embarrassing sequence of events – Daniel Maggio tripped over the blue line and turned the puck over, then coughed it up again when he was checked by Christian Hilbrich – actually turned into just what the Komets needed to take an early lead. After Maggio’s first turnover, teammate Mason Baptista stole the puck right back in the Toledo zone. And after the second turnover, captain Jamie Schaafsma fired a 30-foot shot to set up Baptista for a goal off the rebound and a 1-0 lead 6:01 into the first period.

Maggio had missed Game 5, a 4-1 victory by the Komets on Saturday in Toledo, Ohio, serving his one-game suspension from the ECHL for hitting Simon Denis from behind. Denis, who had one goal and seven points in eight playoff games, missed a second straight game tonight.

Even though Fort Wayne goalie Michael Houser made a flurry of saves with teammate Shawn Szydlowski was in the penalty box for slashing, he was sprawled on the ice and defenseless to stop Zach Nastasiuk from flicking the puck into an open net to tie it at 1 at 14:27.

Toledo took a 2-1 lead 2:19 later when Austen Brassard cut through a gaping hole in the defense, accepted a pass from the blue line from Hilbrich and snapped it past Houser from 15 feet out. But a hooking penalty on Beau Schmitz allowed the Komets’ power play to tie it at 18:13, when Jason Binkley cut to the far post undefended and put a rebound into an open net.

After both goalies came up with huge saves – Nagle on Marco Roy and Houser on Kevin Tansey – Fort Wayne’s Desjardins fought his way to the rebound of a Ryan Culkin shot and snapped it in from 12 feet out for a 3-2 lead at 10:01 of the second period. It was Desjardins’ fourth goal of the series, tops in the series for either team.

Nagle kept his team in it in the third period by thwarting Baptista and Szydlowski at the end of 2-on-1 rushes, and he stopped an Anthony Petruzzelli shot from 20 feet out at 17:23.

Szydlowski cemented the victory with an empty-net goal.

Notes: The referees were Tyler Puddifant and Stephen Thomson. … The Komets played without Phelix Martineau, who aggravated a lower-body injury in Game 5, Justin Hodgman (concussion), all-star Artur Tyanulin and Kevin McKernan. … The Eastern Conference finals will pit the Florida Everblades, who won the ECHL’s regular-season championship, vs. the Adirondack Thunder.

The schedule for the next round is as follows:

Schedule

Who: Komets vs. Colorado

What: Western Conference finals

Series: Best-of-7

Game 1: 9 p.m. Saturday at Colorado

Game 2: 9 p.m. Sunday at Colorado

Game 3: 7:30 p.m. May 16 at Memorial Coliseum

Game 4: 8 p.m. May 18 at the Coliseum

Game 5: 7:30 p.m. May 19 at the Coliseum*

Game 6: 9 p.m. May 22 at Colorado*

Game 7: 9 p.m. May 23 at Colorado*

*If necessary