By Canadian Press

Stiga scores winner, U.S. beats Finland 4-3 in OT to capture world junior gold

Jan 5, 2025 | 8:57 PM

OTTAWA — The United States is golden again.

Teddy Stiga scored at 8:04 of overtime as the Americans battled back from a 3-1 deficit late in the second period to defeat Finland 4-3 and win the country’s second straight world junior hockey championship Sunday.

Cole Hutson, with a goal and an assist, James Hagens and Brandon Svoboda provided the rest of the offence in regulation for the U.S., which secured consecutive men’s under-20 titles for the first time in the program’s history.

Trey Augustine made 20 saves for the Americans, who took gold for a seventh time and will host the 2026 tournament in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn. Ryan Leonard had two assists.

Jesse Kiiskinen, Tuomas Uronen and Emil Pieniniemi replied for Finland, which last won the event in 2019 in Vancouver. Petteri Rimpinen stopped 36 shots for the Finns, who suffered their only other defeat on Boxing Day against Canada. Emil Hemming had two assists.

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Czechia beat Sweden 3-2 in a 14-round shootout to take bronze. Canada finished a disappointing fifth for the second straight year after being ousted by the Czechs in the quarterfinals.

Rimpinen made huge stops on Zeev Buium, Leonard and Hagens in extra period before Augustine made a nice save on Benjamin Rautainen, who scored the OT winner for the Finns against Sweden in the semifinal, to set the stage for Stiga’s five-hole winner off the rush — his first goal of the tournament — after starting the event as a scratch.

Despite the loss, the Finns won their first medal since grabbing silver at the pandemic-delayed 2022 event when the Canadians secured world junior overtime glory in Edmonton.

Finland beat the U.S., which had nine returnees from last year’s championship roster, 4-3 in overtime in the preliminary round and went ahead on a power play at 7:37 of Sunday’s opening period when Kiiskinen scored his sixth.

Expected to be one of the first names off the board at June’s NHL draft, Hagens made it 1-1 at 12:04 when he scored his fifth off a rebound.

The Finns went up 2-1 when Uronen fired past Augustine’s blocker for his second just 59 seconds later. Pieniniemi added his second at 4:52 of the middle period for a 3-1 lead.

The Americans, who topped hosts Sweden in the final of last year’s event in Gothenburg and have three gold medals since 2021, didn’t have a lot going on, but caught a break when Svoboda’s point shot hit a Finn in front of Rimpinen for his third at 17:38.

Hutson then fired home after cutting into the slot for his third with 28.7 seconds left in the period to tie things through 40 minutes.

Rimpinen stopped Leonard on a breakaway five minutes into the third. The American captain, seemingly in the middle of the action all night, then fanned on a tap-in moments later as the teams played an even period to set up the OT heroics.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 5, 2025.

Joshua Clipperton, The Canadian Press

<!– Photo: db54cbf0a4faf473c43d04d2a2ad63cba77d1dc79e2474c4012219af0cb955f9.jpg, Caption:

Finland defenceman Aron Kiviharju (33) blocks a shot on teammate Petteri Rimpinen (30) as USA forward Brandon Svoboda (8), and teammate Max Plante (22) rush the net during third period IIHF World Junior Hockey Championship gold medal game action in Ottawa on Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

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