Ivan Morozov’s goal at 3:24 of overtime lifted Russia to a 5-4 semifinal win over Sweden at the world junior hockey championship on Saturday and a berth in the gold-medal game for the first time in four years.
Yegor Sokolov scored at 8:35 of the third period to force overtime after the Russians blew leads of 1-0 and 3-1.
Russia will play the winner of the Canada/Finland semifinal in Sunday’s championship at 1 p.m. ET. The bronze-medal contest is slated for 9 a.m.
The Russians lost to Finland in the 2016 final and last won gold in 2011 over the Canadians.
Kazakhstan downs Germany in relegation game
Stanislav Alexandrov scored twice, Vladislav Nurek stopped 43 shots and Kazakhstan beat Germany 4-1 on Saturday to force a third relegation game.
Oleg Boiko and Denis Chaporov also scored for Kazakhstan, which won its first game of the tournament. Team scoring-leader Maxim Musorov tacked on two assists.
Luis Schinko scored the lone goal for Germany, which opened the best-of-three relegation round with a 4-0 win on Thursday.
German goaltender Hendrik Hane made 18 saves.
The teams meet again for the deciding game Sunday.