Didn't the russians do the same, brought the Germans down on the deck to fight?
Quite so...
Asking for La-7s, or Yak9Us, would not have helped you at all when trying to chase down German planes over 20k high.
The entire Soviet mentality was to fly low, fight low, engage in dogfights, close the distance, and kill the enemy.
They didn't take shots 1000 yards out (most were really point-blank), they didn't climb up to 20k to hunt for the enemy. They let the enemy come to them. Does no good if the enemy is flying around at 20k and never comes down. They don't accomplish their mission and even if you miss all the action you still win.
P.S. Whoever called the Yak-9T a "ground attack" plane has no clue.