With their sights set on bringing an end to a five-year gold medal drought, Canada squares off against Russia for world junior supremacy Monday night at Air Canada Centre.
The Russian juniors have had Canada’s number of late, defeating their hockey rivals in the medal round in four straight world junior tournaments.
Recent Russian dominance
Despite Russia’s recent dominance of Canada, the two sides are dead even when battling for gold since the turn of the millennium.
Monday night’s clash will mark the seventh time in the last 14 years that Canada and Russia will face off in the gold medal game. The countries have split the six gold medal meetings since 2002.
Canada has met Russia in the gold medal game seven times in the history of the tournament. Russia has won four of those meetings while Canada has claimed three.
Canada-Russia Gold Medal Meetings
The 2015 World Junior Championship has been a good one for the hosts.
Canada has not trailed at any point in the tournament heading into the final, has outscored opponents 34-5 and boasts the top four scorers heading into the gold medal game.
Tournament Scoring Leaders
Canada’s goaltenders have been largely untested thus far, but Zach Fucale – who gets the start Monday night – has posted some impressive numbers in four starts for Canada. He leads the tournament in goals-against average and save percentage.
Tournament Goaltending Leaders
All above statistics provided by Sportsnet Stats.
