The two sides met in their final Group A game at Nokia Arena in Tampere, with both knowing that they needed a win to avoid last place and demotion to Division 1A of the World Championship.

István Sofron gave Hungary a first period lead before Marco Rossi levelled for the Austrians in front of a crowd of 3,068.

Sofron put Hungary back in front and his side looked comfortable when Milán Horváth made it 3-1 in the second period.

Austria battled back, however, grabbing goals from Steven Strong and Lukas Haudum to force an overtime period which ended goalless.

Bernhard Starkbaum was the hero in the shootout, denying all four Hungarian takers as Manuel Ganahl and Dominique Heinrich both netted for Austria.

"I thought the first period was definitely not the hockey we wanted to play," Austria's captain Thomas Raffl said. 

"We were heading into a deciding game but we were a little little flat-footed. 

"We just scrambled a bit. 

"Towards the end of the second period, we found our wheels, we started skating more, we played simple and I thought halfway through the second period we definitely got our game in hand."

In the other Group A game, Sweden, already assured of a place in the quarter-finals, beat Denmark 4-1 after coming from behind in front of 6,573 fans.

Nicklas Jensen gave the Danes the lead but goals from Dennis Everberg, Carl Grundström and a double from André Petersson completed the turnaround.

Sweden are second in the group and are due to face the undefeated United States in their final clash tomorrow, knowing a win will see them top the pile.

Denmark sit fifth, one place adrift of the top four finish needed to reach the quarter-finals.

They must beat defending champions and hosts Finland, who are third and have already qualified, and hope that fourth place Germany slip up against France in order to qualify.

In Group B at Arena Riga, Norway shocked already qualified Canada with a shootout victory after a 2-2 draw before a crowd of 4,834.

Norway, already eliminated, had only ever beaten Canada once before and that was in 2000.

Andreas Martinsen and Sondre Olden fired Norway into a 2-0 lead, before Milan Lucic and Lawson Crouse levelled for the Canadians, the latter scoring just 11 seconds from time.

Jack Quinn and Michael Carcone were denied in the shootout for Canada and four Norwegians scored to claim a famous win.

"This is huge for us," said Norway's veteran Ken Andre Olimb.

"I think it's been 23 years since the last time, so it's a big achievement."

In the other Group B clash, eliminated Kazakhstan defeated already relegated Slovenia 4-3.

Nikita Mikhailis, Batyrlan Muratov, Evgeni Rymarev and Maxim Mukhametov were the Kazakh goalscorers as Anže Kuralt scored twice for Slovenia, alongside a Jan Drozg strike.

Group B is set to conclude tomorrow with leaders Switzerland, second place Czech Republic and third placed Canada already through to the quarter-finals.

Slovakia and Latvia are battling for the final spot with the former needing to beat Norway to stand any chance of leap-frogging the hosts into fourth.

They will also need Latvia to lose to undefeated Switzerland or not pick up a point by taking the game to overtime.