TORONTO — Left with nothing play for at the World Cup of Hockey, coach John Tortorella told his United States players to play a game for themselves.

They played hard, gave effort in a meaningless round-robin finale but still lost 4-3 to the Czech Republic on Thursday night. With an 0-3-0 record and a minus-6 goal differential, the U.S. finished seventh among eight teams, ahead of only Finland.

“The bottom line is we leave here with nothing,” Tortorella said. “Certainly we can’t be happy about that.”

Previous losses to Team Europe and Canada eliminated the Americans from contention. While Canada, Sweden, Europe and Russia prepare for the semifinals this weekend, the U.S. and Czech Republic played out the string in front of a half-empty arena.

Joe Pavelski, Justin Abdelkader and Ryan McDonagh scored for the U.S., which did not unravel in a meaningless game like it did in the 2014 Olympic bronze medal game. Ben Bishop allowed four goals on 20 shots in two periods, and Cory Schneider made seven saves in relief.

Petr Mrazek stopped 36 of the 39 shots he faced to backstop the Czech Republic to its first victory. Milan Michalek scored twice and Zbynek Michalek and Andrej Sustr each had a goal.

Russia 3, Finland 0

TORONTO — Vladimir Tarasenko and Ivan Telegin scored 1:19 apart in the second period and Russia beat Finland 3-0 on Thursday to set up a World Cup of Hockey semifinal against Canada — and knock out Team North America.

“The opportunity is huge,” Russian captain Alex Ovechkin said about facing Canada. “They have a pretty good team with solid players.”

Evgeni Malkin scored in the third period for Russia (2-1-0), and Sergei Bobrovsky made 21 saves.

“It’s going to be a great, great challenge and we accept it,” Russian forward Evgeny Kuznetsov said.