Rob Gronkowski stars as New England Patriots beat Kansas City Chiefs

The New England Patriots reached their fifth straight AFC Championship game with a 27-20 win over the Kansas City Chiefs.

Tom Brady and Rob Gronkowski combined for two touchdowns as the reigning champions ended the Chiefs' winning streak at 11 games and set up a clash against either the Denver Broncos or Pittsburgh Steelers.

The Patriots began strongly with Brady engineering a fluent opening drive that ended with Gronkowski grabbing an eight-yard touchdown pass to make it 7-0.

Brady was narrowly denied a rushing touchdown on review with 3:25 remaining in the first-half, but a quarterback sneak from the half-yard line on the very next play put the Patriots 14-3 in front - it became 14-6 at the interval after Cairo Santos hit a second field goal.

Gronkowski's second score increased New England's lead to 21-6 midway through the third quarter, but the Chiefs were in no mood to give up on their bid to dethrone the Patriots and cut the deficit when Alex Smith found Albert Wilson for a 10-yard touchdown.

They were left needing two more scores in the final 10 minutes when Stephen Gotskowski hit his second field goal to make it 27-13 and, after earlier handing the ball over on downs, the Chiefs made use of their next drive to score on a one-yard plunge by running back Charcandrick West.

But with only 1:18 remaining by the time West scored, the Chiefs were forced to go for an onside kick, which was grabbed by Gronkowski - who else? - and the Patriots were able to run out the clock to secure their progress.

"It's pretty special to get back to another AFC championship game," said Brady, who will play for the conference title for the 10th time in his career.

"It's pretty cool. It's hard to do, man. You've got to grind throughout the entire year. There's only four teams playing next week and we're one of them. That game means a lot."

A win for the Broncos will mean New England having to play in Denver next Sunday, while a Steelers victory will see the AFC Championship Game played in Foxboro.

As for the Chiefs, coach Andy Reid added: "It gives us a great example of where we need to be.

"This is a good experience for us. That's the way we'll take it. We'll learn from our mistakes. I'm proud of my guys, man. They battled like crazy this year, but came up a little short. We'll be a better team for it next year."

Watch the Denver Broncos face the Pittsburgh Steelers live on Sky Sports 2 HD from 9pm on Sunday.