U joint clips

This seemed like a straight forward process but it is not going as I had envisioned.

Removing my driveshaft, I had one cap fall and naturally cannot find one bearing anywhere. So I got a replacement U-joint where I figured to simply replace the two caps that mount between the driveshaft and rear.

I figured the clips would be put into place first and simply slide the shaft in place from there. But it seems to be too tight to allow that. By putting one clip on in order to get both caps in place, I now cannot seem to get the second clip in place.
Is there a simple way of getting this in place?