HELSINKI, Finland — Pierre-Luc Dubois scored two goals to lead defending champion Canada to a 5-3 victory over Germany in their opener at the Ice Hockey World Championship on Friday.

Cole Sillinger and Dubois scored from the slot in the first half of the Group A game in Helsinki.

Germany cut the deficit to one, then Dubois and Kent Johnson scored power-play goals and Noah Gregor added one more to make it 5-1 after the half.

Moritz Seider registered a goal and two assists for Germany.

USA took a 3-0 lead over Latvia after the first half and secured a 4-1 win in their Group B opener in Tampere.

Captain Seth Jones scored a power-play goal and added an assist on a shorthanded goal, and Riley Barber, Thomas Bordeleau and Sam Lafferty each scored. Goalkeeper Strauss Mann stopped 24 shots.

In another Group B game, Toni Rajala had a goal and two assists as last year’s runners-up Finland shut out Norway 5-0.

Moreover, Slovakia beat France 4-2 in Group A.

It is the first world championship without any Russian representation since 1962, when the Soviet Union did not play in Colorado due to Cold War tensions over the construction of the Berlin Wall.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine prompted tournament host Finland to call for the exclusion of Russia and its ally Belarus. The International Ice Hockey Federation replaced them with France and Austria and deprived Russia of the rights to organize the 2023 world championship.