World Junior Hockey Championship 2018 Final: Canada Wins Gold over Sweden

Canada ended its two-year gold-medal drought at the 2018 World Junior Hockey Championship on Friday with a thrilling 3-1 win over Sweden. 

With less than two minutes remaining in the third period and the score tied at one, Canada took the lead on Tyler Steenbergen's goal that beat Swedish goalie Filip Gustavsson to secure the win. An empty-net goal by Alex Formenton with 1:14 left provided insurance for the Canadian team.   

The game appeared destined for overtime based on how evenly matched Canada and Sweden had been in the first 58 minutes.

Steenbergen was able to find the smallest of openings against the Swedish defense and Gustavsson to put Canada over the top without being forced to a sudden-death overtime situation:

A fifth-round pick by the Arizona Coyotes in 2017, Steenbergen was an unlikely hero for the Canadian team. He played just over three minutes during the first two periods before finding the spotlight at the end of the game. 

TSN's Mark Masters broke down all the ways in which Steenbergen's final act against Sweden seemingly came out of nowhere:

Canada opened the scoring less than two minutes into the second period when Dillon Dube found an inside angle to take a pass from Jordan Kyrou and put the puck past Gustavsson. 

Tim Soderlund, who was named player of the game along with Canada goalie Carter Hart, evened things up for Sweden with a short-handed goal with seven minutes to go in the second period. 

That was a common theme for Sweden throughout this tournament. The team had two short-handed goals in its 4-2 semifinal win over the United States on Thursday and four overall in the World Junior Championships. 

Hart was terrific in net for the Canadian team. The 19-year-old Philadelphia Flyers prospect finished with 35 saves. Mike Zeisberger of NHL.com noted this was a redemption game for Hart after what happened in last year's tournament:

This marks Canada's 17th win all-time at the World Junior Championships, and it has medaled six times in nine tournaments since 2010. 

Sweden ensured itself a medal in the World Junior Championships when it defeated the U.S. on Thursday. Despite falling short of the country's first gold since 2012, this was its best finish at this tournament in four years.