This year’s trade deadline birthed one of the most improbable and remarkable unions in NHL history.

Patrick Kane and Vladimir Tarasenko, two generational players who were the focal point of one of the most riveting rivalries in the Western Conference between the Blues and Blackhawks, landed in New York with the Rangers after skating their entire careers as Midwest rivals.

With more than a decade of countless memorable regular-season clashes and two playoff series against each other, Kane and Tarasenko sit next to each other on the Rangers team plane.

They sit side by side for every single flight.

They share stories about their respective childhoods in Buffalo and Russia.

They play backgammon.

It’s difficult to put in perspective how many times these two elite forwards went head-to-head over the years.

How many heartbreaking goals and clutch points they’ve recorded against each other.

Each of them won one postseason series over the other, and they remember each game vividly.

Now, Kane and Tarasenko share a locker room.

They share teammates, a coaching staff and a home arena in Madison Square Garden.

Two of the most notable NHL names, who established themselves as the players they are today on opposite ends of the ice, share a common goal of helping the New York Rangers win a Stanley Cup.

“In both guy’s cases, the bigger the game, the better they play,” Ken Hitchcock, who coached the Blues during the 2014 and 2016 series against Kane and the Blackhawks, told The Post in a phone call.

“You’ve got two game burners who are going to impact some playoff games, because they both know how to win in the playoffs. What you’re seeing now [in the regular season], add 25 percent to it because that’s where it’s going to get amped up with these two guys. They both can amp up their games.”

The immense mutual respect Kane and Tarasenko have for one another has come through in their budding friendship as teammates.

They are grateful to be going through this experience of adjusting to a new team together.

More than anything, however, Kane and Tarasenko are relieved to not be playing against each other.

Kane was a terror for St. Louis to play against. Tarasenko gave Chicago fits.

Each club was on the wrong end of career-defining moments for both players on more than one occasion.

That’s all been set aside now. Kane and Tarasenko have teamed up.

The Rangers hope to reap the benefits.

The adjective that seems to come to everybody’s mind when describing the Blues-Blackhawks rivalry is intense.

Since 1970, the two clubs have been in the same division.

It doesn’t matter if it’s a regular-season game or a playoff game, the magnitude of the matchup always transcends its actual meaning.

There’s respect between both organizations, but also genuine hatred.

Kane and Tarasenko had been at the forefront of the two teams’ feud since the latter came into the league in 2012-13.

“Besides him scoring on us every game?” Kane asked The Post rhetorically with a smile when prompted to recall his memories from squaring off with Tarasenko and St. Louis. “I think one time it was playoffs and I was mad after a shift and we were both coming back to the bench. I tried to like give him a shove and I just bounced off. He’s so strong. I was like, ‘Yeah, probably won’t try that again.’ ”

The Blackhawks defeated the Blues in six games in the first round of 2014 playoffs, while the opposite result occurred in seven games in the first round of the 2016 playoffs.

Both players are scattered all over the score sheets in both series.

There was Game 4 in 2014, when Kane and Tarasenko each scored twice, including an overtime winner from Kane to knot the series at two-all.

Chicago went on to take the next two to advance.

“I remember the confidence level of their team was incredible,” Tarasenko told The Post. “We won the first two games at home, we went to Chicago for Game 3 and I just remember as a young guy looking at the other team and their players are all smiling. It felt like they had no stress, they just felt very confident and believed in their team.

“That experience and other experiences helped us in 2019 to win the whole thing because you have to believe in your group, whatever happens, there is a chance to come back. Never give up.”

When the two teams met again in 2016, the Blues jumped out to a 3-1 series lead with the help of Tarasenko’s three-point performance in Game 4.

But another game-winning goal from Kane in double overtime in Game 5 allowed Chicago to push the series to Game 7, in which the Blues took a 3-2 victory to move on.

Tarasenko finished with eight goals and two assists in 13 postseason meetings with the Blackhawks, while also racking up 20 goals and 12 assists with a plus-11 rating in 33 regular-season games against Chicago since 2012-13.

Kane collected four goals and dished out nine assists with a plus-five rating in 13 playoff games against the Blues, in addition to the 17 tallies and 23 assists he posted in 40 regular-season contests over the same span.

“You cannot give an odd-man rush to either one of them because they’ll make you pay big time,” said Hitchcock, who is now a coaching consultant for the Blues. “I saw it very early with Vladi. Unfortunately, for me, I had to play against it with Kane. I admire what Vladi did because we didn’t have a Jonathan Toews. We didn’t have that go-to center.

“We had a lot of really honest players, but there were a lot of times where Vladi had two guys on him all the time.”

That is where Tarasenko and Kane differed.

As much as they both were the guy for their respective teams, Kane had a much stronger supporting cast than Tarasenko, who began his NHL career with zero North American background.

The way Tarasenko integrated himself into the St. Louis community and Midwestern culture was special for Hitchcock to watch.

He barely spoke English when he arrived as a 21-year-old.

By the time he was traded to the Rangers along with defenseman Niko Mikkola on Feb. 9, in exchange for a conditional 2023 first-round pick, a 2024 fourth-round pick, Sammy Blais and Hunter Skinner, Tarasenko was a prominent figure in a state that is more than 5,000 miles away from his birthplace in Yaroslavl, Russia.

Tarasenko built a reputation around the NHL as a sharp shooter and a big-game player, but most marvel at his strength.

“He was one of those players that you couldn’t push out of a game,” said Andrew Ladd, who played for Chicago in the 2016 playoff series.

Kane embodied the NHL’s shift to speed and skill. What separates him from the rest of the players like him that followed is the consistency with which he impacted big moments and important games.

Teams are unnerved when they see Kane on the ice.

He skates with a fierce determination to score, and given any time or space, he usually does just that.

For a player of a smaller stature, Kane not only survived the NHL’s big-man game, but he’s thrived.

“Right away, I felt respect for him,” said Kane’s former Blackhawks teammate turned Rangers teammate Artemi Panarin, who noted that their language barrier early on didn’t stop Kane from initiating their friendship.

Tarasenko had one bone to pick with Kane after the 34-year-old wing pushed his way to the Rangers, who cleared multiple roster and cap hurdles before the Feb. 28 trade with Chicago went down.

“His celebrations after goals, especially against us, was kind of a little bit too much, I think,” he said with a laugh. “I spoke with him about it.”

Grievances aside, Tarasenko was someone Kane leaned on when he first arrived in New York.

Kane was in Chicago for 16 years and Tarasenko was in St. Louis for 11, so the two helped each other get up to speed on how things operated on Broadway.

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Tarasenko had a lot more time to settle in and that was evident in the eight goals and 13 assists he recorded in 31 games.

There was a much slower adjustment period for Kane in his 19 contests, over which he still chipped in five goals and seven assists.

If both player’s track records say anything, however, it’s that they can reach a different level when it really matters.

That time is now.

From opposite benches of one of the top rivalries in the Western Conference to sharing one with the Rangers in a rivalry playoff series against the Devils in the Eastern Conference, Kane and Tarasenko will compete for a Stanley Cup together instead of thwarting each other.

The Rangers hope that Tarasenko and Kane share some gaudy celebrations together in the future.

“It shows you the commitment, the team wants to win,” Tarasenko said of joining forces with Kane. “I think everybody’s excited. We have a very tight group of guys. We’re excited to be here.”