Yet another chapter in the storied Canada–Russia junior hockey rivalry is in the books, but this time, Canada eked out a memorable 5–4 win at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto on Monday night.
It’s Canada’s first gold medal since 2009 at this tournament for players under the age of 20 and it banished recent bad memories against its bitter rival.
Here are three takeaways from the gold medal game and the world junior hockey championship tournament overall:
1. Among the best Canadian junior teams ever
Despite Canada nearly blowing a 5–1 lead amid haunting memories of the 2011 third-period gold medal game collapse to Russia, let’s not forget Canada was absolutely dominant in this tournament.
Canada won every game it played without needing overtime or a shootout. Just like the Sochi 2014 men’s Olympic team, Canada never trailed in the tournament. But this junior gold medal team never even allowed the opponent to tie the game after it took the lead. Russia was the only team to outshoot Canada in seven games.
Canada outscored its opposition 39–9 and had the tournament’s top three leading scorers (Sam Reinhart, Nic Petan, and Connor McDavid each with 11 points in 7 games).
