Momentum can be fickle.

It was clearly on the Canadiens' side Monday night as they took a 3-2 lead into the third period of their game against Carolina and then went on the power play at 3: 02 of the second period.

Thirteen seconds later, Eric Staal scored a short-handed goal and it was the Hurricanes who were flirting with the momentum that produced a 5-3 win at the Bell Centre.

"It was a lost draw on our part," explained Erik Cole. "It was kind of a fumbling clearing play and instead of being aggressive coming down the boards, we backed off. They got a stick on it and Staal got the puck and made an Eric Staal play."

Staal made a series of Erik Staal plays. He won a faceoff against David Desharnais in the Carolina zone and sent the puck down the ice. He then took advantage of a Tomas Kaberle giveaway to grab the puck in the neutral zone and then went around Kaberle to go in alone of Carey Price.

"That was key," said Canadiens head coach Randy Cunneyworth. "Any time Eric Staal is on the ice, you have to be wary of that."

"You have to give them credit," Cunneyworth added. "There were some loose pucks they gained. We had guys in the right position (but) they were sharp on the puck. It's a game of inches and on (Jamie McBain's game-winning, power-play goal) we got a piece of it, but not enough."

"When you're on the power play, you can't give up a goal like that," Desharnais said of the short-handed goal. "I didn't think we played bad. We were desperate, we were working. The intensity was there, but there were some mistakes that ended up in the back of our net."

"The bottom line is that we had a great period and took the lead after (Tomas Plekanec's) goal and the power-play goals, but the short-handed goal gave them wings," Mathieu Darche said.

Cole said the Hurricanes didn't play like the last-place team in the Eastern Conference. "When they came at us and forechecked really hard, they were a more aggressive team than we've seen from them and they forced us to put pucks in the middle of the ice and that's a little uncharacteristic for us."

Defenceman P.K. Subban took a penalty at the final buzzer after he went to the defence of Cole and challenged Tim Gleason. Cole said he was responsible for starting the incident when he grabbed goaltender Cam Ward's stick.

"Gleason doing his job and protecting the goaltender," Cole said. "I grabbed Wardo's butt end and he yelled about it and Gleason jumped in."

While the third period proved to be the Canadiens' undoing, nobody was happy with the Canadiens' start. They were outshot 16-6 in the first period and were being outshot 23-8 when Jaroslav Spacek gave Carolina a 2-0 lead at 9: 21 of the second period.

"I didn't like our start at all," Cunneyworth said. "I don't think that's acceptable. Our first period was not what we anticipated. We needed to be more direct and get pucks to the net. We were rewarded in the second with some good, hard, honest efforts."

Scott Gomez and Andrei Kostitsyn sat for a good part of the game. Gomez played only two shifts in the third and was on the ice for 7: 48. Kostitsyn played only 4: 20 with one shift in the third period.

"At certain times, we were looking for better matchups," Cunneyworth explained. "There was a little bit of that but we were also looking for bigger efforts."