MOSCOW — Canada's winning streak at the world hockey championship has ended at 16 games after a 4-0 loss to Finland in the preliminary-round finale for both teams.

After riding a perfect 10-0 record to a gold medal last year in Prague, the Canadians rolled through the first six games of this year's round-robin before Tuesday's shutout loss to unbeaten Finland at Yubileiny Arena.

Canada outshot the Finns 8-5 and controlled the play in a scoreless first period, but Finland broke the game open in the second with three goals on seven shots.

Defenceman Tommi Kivisto opened the scoring at the 6:10 mark of the middle frame when he threaded a wrist shot from the blue line past a screened Cam Talbot. That ended the Canadian goalie's shutout streak at 108 minutes 34 seconds.

At 16:03, Talbot was beaten by a slapshot from the left circle by Leo Komarov to the delight of the pro-Finnish crowd. Mika Pyorala extended the lead to 3-0 and Jarno Kuliranta rounded out the scoring early in the third.

Finnish star and top draft prospect Patrik Laine was hobbled in the second period after getting tangled up with Canadian captain Corey Perry, but was able to return to game action despite favouring his leg.

With the loss, Canada (6-0-0-1) finished second in the Group B standings with 18 points while the Finns (7-0-0-0) had the maximum 21 points. Canada will now face Sweden on Thursday in St. Petersburg in quarter-final play while Finland plays Denmark.

Canada's last defeat at this tournament was also to Finland, a 3-2 loss in the quarter-final of the 2014 event in Minsk, Belarus.

Finland won the gold medal at the world junior hockey championship in Helsinki last January and also claimed gold at the under-18 tournament in North Dakota in April. A win at the world hockey championship would make Finland the first team to claim all three titles in one year since the U18 tournament was introduced in 1999.

Earlier on Tuesday, the Czech Republic clinched first place in Group A with a 5-4 win over Switzerland to secure a quarter-final matchup with the U.S. on Thursday in Moscow. Host Russia's 4-1 win over Sweden secured second place in Group A and a Thursday game against Germany.

Hungary joined Kazakhstan as the second team to be relegated back to Division 1A for next season after a 3-0 loss to Belarus.