World Juniors: Fear The Finns In The Gold Medal Game

OTTAWA - The Pesky Finns are at it again at the world juniors.

With a white-knuckle overtime win against archrival Sweden in the semifinal, Finland has the chance to secure its fourth gold medal in 11 years.

With the win, the last undefeated team in the tournament is no longer unblemished. But it was Finland's own loss in the round-robin opener against Canada that may have set the table for what has become a whole lotta momentum for the squad.

"Many times you need the time to grow up to get there," said coach Lauri Mikkola. "That first game was the big lesson for this team. After that, we've been doing a lot of things right and this is the result."

Finland was blanked 4-0 by Canada, but they haven't lost since. On top of sending Sweden to the bronze-medal game, let's not forget that the Finns also beat Team USA during the round-robin, impressive given the fact the Americans were the strongest team on paper heading into Ottawa. While Canada sputtered after that first game, the Finns took the setback as a wake-up call.

"Every game matters," said center Konsta Helenius. "Seven games total, so we have to play our best hockey every game."

Helenius, the Buffalo Sabres first-rounder, is certainly playing some high-level hockey right now. The talented pivot assisted on all four Finland goals against Sweden and as one of the few returning players from last year's squad, has been an influential leader on the team.

While Helenius and Emil Hemming (DAL) are the only first-rounders on the Finnish side, we've learned time and again not to doubt Team Sisu in international tournaments. Finland has always played a team game, and in the past decade, the program has become the most successful world junior squad from Europe: Finland is the only country outside of North America to win gold in the past 10 years.

It's rare for anyone to have a reason to question Finland's tenacity, but the players themselves weren't happy with their start against Canada and clearly took that lesson to heart.

"We started to work a lot more," Hemming said. "First we were just watching, then the last period against Canada, we started to play and get chances."

Since then, the Finns have been on a heater and now, they have a chance to win another gold medal. With all that momentum, don't count them out.

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Related: The Hockey News Big Show: Setting Up A Thrilling World Juniors Finish And Dissecting Canada's Loss