MALMO, Sweden – Brent Sutter answered questions with a wry smile, sounding flummoxed by his team’s play in their 5-1 loss to Finland in the world junior championship semifinal.

The defeat meant Canada will not win gold at the tournament for the fifth-straight year.

When queried about that subject, Sutter wasn’t as surprised. And he doesn’t think anyone else should be either.

“I get kind of sensitive to all that. And I have been for the last four years,” the Canadian head coach said. “You guys and a lot of people in our country expect us to win every year just because we’re Canadians. And rightly so; it’s our culture and we want to portray that it’s our game.

The reality is that with junior hockey now across the world is there’s a lot of good teams and a lot of good players in each country. It’s shown in this tournament.”

Sutter was handpicked by Hockey Canada to lead the under-20 program, which hadn’t won a gold medal since 2009 and came home empty handed last year for the first time in 15 tournaments.

Sutter coached Canada to gold in 2005 and 2006, posting perfect 6-0 records each time.

His Canadian team has gone 4-1-1 so far in 2014.

“I was telling (Hockey Canada president and CEO) Bob Nicholson this a couple days ago, I said, ‘This is night and day from ’06.’” Sutter said. “Back then, there were three or four teams.

“But now, there are six or eight teams that can beat anybody any given night. You have to have your A-game going all the time.”

Few know that on this year’s team like Jonathan Drouin.

Drouin, defenceman Griffin Reinhart and goaltender Jake Paterson are the only three returnees.

Canada lost by the very same score in the semifinal to the United States a year ago.

“We’re supposed to be one of the best hockey countries,” said the Canadian alternate captain, fighting back tears. “I don’t think we’ve proved that in the last five years.

“Teams are getting better and better. I don’t think we were ready for today.”

Sutter agreed, stating, “The reality is tonight that the better team won.”

That doesn’t mean he’s going to start second-guessing anything.

Hockey Canada invited just 25 players to its selection camp this year, cutting only three players to form the final roster.

“That has nothing to do with losing tonight. Nothing,” Sutter said. “We took the right players. We firmly believe we have the right players on this team.”

This is the second-youngest team Canada has ever sent to the tournament, averaging 18 years, 10 months and 25 days. The youngest team was disqualified 1987 team.

Canada’s lineup also boasts three players still eligible for the NHL draft. Aaron Ekblad and Sam Reinhart are considered front-runners for top spot in 2014. Connor McDavid headlines the 2015 class.

That total is the most since 2008 when Drew Doughty, Luke Schenn, Steven Stamkos and John Tavares were on the gold-medal winning roster.