REGINA -- The Regina Pats are one win away from mission accomplished.

The host team eliminated the OHL champion Hamilton Bulldogs from the 100th Memorial Cup with a 4-2 win in front of a raucous crowd of 6,484 fans at the Brandt Centre on Friday night.

"Everybody is just electric right now, we're all pumped about the win and we've got a redemption shot at (Acadie-Bathurst)," said Pats goalie Max Paddock.

The 17-year-old netminder is a big reason that his team is moving as he raised his game up to another level with 44 saves in the victory.

"Definitely my best game of my life that I've ever played, especially on that stage that it's at, but just a good day today," said Paddock after the win.

Throughout the game, Paddock made the first save and then allowed his team to clean up the mess around the net.

"He was awesome, Pads held in there and made some big saves for us and when we needed him, he was there, in games like that you need your goaltender to step up and he did that," said Pats forward Cameron Hebig.

Bulldogs goalie Kaden Fulcher was equal to the task at the other end, making 20 stops in the loss, but it will be one play that he replays in his mind for a while.

With just under six minutes to play, Fulcher was tangled up with Pats captain Sam Steel, who stole the puck away and put past a pair of diving Bulldogs and into the empty net for what turned out to be the game- winning goal.

"That's probably the toughest way to lose a hockey game, at the end of the day, I'd rather have one go in from the red line, a clean shot that beat me than have something that might be considered controversial go in," said Fulcher. "It's one that you're always going to be wondering about and at the end of the day, it's tough because you can't get it back and it's going to haunt me for a while."

Steel's goal put the Pats in front by two and looked like it had sealed the game, but as has been typical at this tournament so far, the Bulldogs went right back down the ice and Will Bitten picked up his first of the tournament to cut the lead back down to one.

The Bulldogs pressed over the final five minutes for the equalizer, but Jake Leschyshyn iced the win, sliding the puck into an empty net with five seconds to play.

"I told them at the end of the second, we're going to go down with a lot of pride and we're going down swinging and I think we did that," said Bulldogs head coach John Gruden.

"We ran into a team that did all the little things right to give themselves a chance to win and they did that."

Hamilton only lost twice at the tournament, falling to Regina in the first game last Friday and then again to the Pats in the semifinal.

"We played a good game and deserved a little bit better, but it just came down to turnovers and little mishaps that really cost us," said Bulldogs forward Robert Thomas.

The Pats got off to a quick start in the win with Austin Pratt scoring his first goal in 36 games to open the scoring just 5:22 into the contest.

Despite a four-minute power play to start the second, the score stayed 1-0 until Bulldogs defenceman Nicolas Mattinen blasted a shot past Paddock 7:35 into the second.

Hebig put his team back in front with his fourth of the tournament just past the midway point of the second to set up another wild final period.

"We're the underdogs and underdogs have to want it bad and they have to play desperate every single game, so that's how we're approaching this and we want it really bad," said Hebig.

The Pats will now have the opportunity to win the Memorial Cup for the first time since 1974 and do it on their home ice. The team was savouring the win after the game, but were ready to get the focus back on the task at hand right away.

"We've got to move on from this win and focus on Sunday now, we've still got work to do and it's the biggest game of all our careers, so we look forward to that and we're one step away, so lets go get it," said Hebig.

Regina's only loss of the tournament came at the hands of the Acadie-Bathurst Titan when they lost 8-6 last Sunday. A week later, the Pats will look to get their revenge.

The Memorial Cup final hits the ice at 5 p.m. Sunday.