The National Post reports that National Hockey League chief legal officer Bill Daly told a New York-based sports website that, if collective bargaining talks with the players' association continue to progress as they did last Friday, a deal could "get done by early June."
Daly was also quoted by MSGNetwork.com columnist Stan Fischler as saying, "we are on our way home."
Additional meetings have been scheduled to take place later this week.
When contacted by the Post, Daly appeared to back away a bit from his earlier comments.
"Obviously, the sooner we can get this done and behind us, the better off we'll all be," he told the Post by email. "We'll have to see if we can continue to make progress. It's really too early to say when a deal could be concluded.
"We didn't get anything resolved, per se, but I thought we had a good, productive week of meetings last week," Daly added to the Post. "Hopefully, we can continue and build off of that."
The NHL and NHL Players' Association will resume labour talks Wednesday and Thursday in Chicago.
Both sides are quick to point out there's lots of work ahead but at least there's light at the end of the tunnel - even if binoculars are still needed to see it at this stage.
"Until you get something done, nothing is done," Devils CEO and GM Lou Lamoriello, a key player in the talks, cautioned Tuesday from New Jersey. "The only thing that you can take as a positive is that there is continuous talk and there doesn't seem to be interruptions and to me, that's the only way something will get done if it's to get done.
"But I don't want to be optimistic and certainly not pessimistic by any means."
The two sides met for four days last week in New York, including 22 hours over Thursday and Friday. And they hope to meet every week from here on in until a deal is finally agreed upon. They've met 14 times since commissioner Gary Bettman announced the cancellation of the season on Feb. 15.
"It's too early to get excited," Vincent Damphousse, a member of the players' executive committee, said Tuesday. "I hope it's going to get settled but it's too soon to be too optimistic or to say that we're close to agreeing on a deal. It's too premature to say that.
"But we're meeting and we're talking about all kinds of things and we're trying to find common ground. That's the best way I can describe things right now."
The lockout is more than eight months old and has wiped out the entire season, robbing fans of a Stanley Cup champion for the first time since 1919. The entry draft in Ottawa was also scrapped.
Many are stunned at how long the NHL labour saga has gone.
"When you're in this business for the time I've been in, unfortunately you're not amazed any more at things that transpire," Lamoriello said. "But I still could have not ever imagined that this would have transpired.
"That's why I can't make a prediction on what the future is until something is actually put on a piece of paper."
The NHL desperately wants to make a deal in the next month, before corporate sponsors pull their support and ESPN decides what to do with an option on its contract with the league. The players, in turn, are just as keen to end a lockout that has cost them over $1 billion US in lost salaries. The league lost over $2 billion in revenues.
The union and the league are trying to find common ground on what constitutes revenue in order to flesh out the union's April 4 offer. That system featured an upper and lower limit on team-by-team payrolls - a salary cap - which fluctuates year to year depending on revenues.
In the meantime, Boston hedge fund Bain Capital continues its determined effort to buy the damaged league. Word came last week that Bain upped its offer from $3.3 billion in March to $4.3 billion to buy all 30 teams. But sources indicated Tuesday that the NHL has no interest in the offer.