ESPN Hockey

BERN, Switzerland -- Russia scored three power-play goals to beat the United States 4-1 in the second round of the ice hockey world championship on Saturday.

The U.S. took an early lead but paid for committing too many penalties as Russia rallied to make it 3-1 at the end of the first period.

Russia got another power-play goal early in the second, and the Americans never looked close to a comeback in the teams' first meeting at the worlds in five years.

Defending champion Russia secured a spot in the quarterfinals as a top seed, having won Group E with a game to spare.

"This was the best game so far for us," defenseman Denis Grebeshkov. "I know the real potential of our team so that is the way we should play every night."

The U.S. can still seal a No. 2 seeding in the last eight by beating host Switzerland on Monday.

"We took a few penalties because we weren't skating, and our special teams let us down," U.S. coach Ron Wilson said. "We just played on the perimeter and didn't penetrate their defense."

Also, Belarus upset Finland in a shootout after a 1-1 tie in Zurich and will advance from Group F if unbeaten Canada beats last-place Norway on Sunday.

Latvia and the Czech Republic are on the brink of knockout play after dominating wins. Latvia routed France 7-1 in Bern and the Czechs handed Slovakia an 8-0 thrashing in Zurich to eliminate its neighbor.

The Russian-American clash was dominated by penalties, played by teams who came in averaging only eight penalty minutes per game.

"I don't think this game differs much internationally from the NHL," U.S. captain Dustin Brown said. "It's all about [penalty killing], power play and goaltending."

The U.S. led at just 3:16, when forward Lee Stempniak cut in through the left circle to send a wrist shot through the pads of goalie Ilya Bryzgalov.

But the Americans were quickly called twice for hooking and Russia took full advantage. Oleg Saprykin tied it with a shot from the crease on the first power play, and Alexander Perezhogin connected on a pass from behind the net on the second. It was 3-1 at 17:06 when Sergei Mozyakin's slap shot beat goalie Robert Esche low to his right.

In the second period, Kyle Okposo was called for charging and Alex Radulov increased Russia's lead at 1:36 by scoring off a reverse back-hand pass from Saprykin.

Russia killed two penalties then five minutes more when Vitali Vishnevsky sent Brown into the boards at 12:31 of the second and took a game misconduct call.

"They got some shots on the net then," Grebeshkov said. "Beside that we were in control of the game pretty much the whole time."

Brown was banged up in the knees and back of the head by the "pretty dirty" hit but had no complaints about the result.

"We showed a lot of emotion, we just need to harness that emotion and put it in the right direction," he said. "Tonight I think we got off our game."

The experienced Russians shut down the young American team -- average age of just over 24 -- the rest of the way. The only Russian player younger than 24 was Radulov, the 22-year-old forward who broke his NHL contract last summer to play for native club Salavat Yulayev.

Bryzgalov had 26 saves for the win. Esche had 28 stops.