Significant developments in the Patrick Kane trade on Sunday.

It feels like just about everyone around the National Hockey League is holding their breath as they wait for the dam to finally burst on the Patrick Kane trade, but moves from the Rangers on Sunday appear to indicate that we may not be so close to a trade actually materializing just yet.

On Sunday, the Rangers were forced to call up center Ryan Carpenter from the Hartford Wolfpack in order to have 18 skaters as per the rules of the Collective Bargaining Agreement, taking a chunk of their cap space in the process. While it is believed that Carpenter will likely be sent back down again in short order, this also means that we aren't likely to see Patrick Kane traded on Sunday.

What made this move so notable though was the fact that neither Ryan Carpenter nor Braden Schneider were utilized by the Rangers during Sunday's game, meaning that in reality they played today's game against the Los Angeles Kings with only 16 skaters. According to Rangers insider Larry Brooks, the motivation for this decision comes as a result of the Rangers' desire to send both men back down following the game, something they wouldn't be capable of doing if either man were to be injured during the game.

As Brooks points out the Rangers are jumping through a ton of hoops for cap related reasons, but that also now gives us a clearer picture of how and when this trade may happen.

As per Cap Friendly, the Rangers won't have enough cap space to make this move until Wednesday at the earliest, assuming that they find a third team to take on 25% of Kane's salary with the Blackhawks retaining 50%. NHL insider Chris Johnston believes that we could even see this trade pushed all the way down to the final hour, with the Rangers hoping to accrue as much cap as possible before the deadline.

There was one way this process could have been accelerated, and that would have been if the injury that Rangers defenseman Ryan Lindgren suffered over the weekend had proved serious enough to earn him a trip to long-term injured reserve. That would have given the Rangers the cap space needed to pull the trigger early, however Rangers head coach Gerard Gallant appears to have dispelled that notion earlier today.

"I don't think it's serious," said Gallant of Lindgren's injury.

Barring any drastic changes, it sounds like all the hype for a Patrick Kane trade is going to have to wait, at least until Wednesday.