Some of Amanda Kessel’s earliest memories of the Rangers start with her younger brother, Blake Kessel.

Though Blake wasn’t a goaltender and grew up in Wisconsin, a Mike Richter 1994 Stanley Cup champion Rangers jersey hung in his bedroom.

“He had a Rangers wallet, too,” Kessel, a gold medalist for the United States women’s national hockey team in the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics, told The Post. “It’s funny to think that now I’ll be working with them.”

On July 2, the Rangers announced their sponsorship of a girls youth hockey program — Junior Rangers Girls Hockey — with Amanda Kessel as its official ambassador.

A collection of 13 rinks across the Tri-State area agreed to host youth hockey programs and a recreational league for girls ages 14 and under.

Kessel grew up rooting for whatever NHL team was winning that year, but she said the Rangers’ historic franchise always stood out to her.

That’s similar to how Kessel has always stood out to Rangers team president John Davidson.

Though he wasn’t a part of the team when it was decided Kessel was the woman for the youth-hockey job, Davidson said he admires the way the 27-year-old carries herself. Between team owner Jim Dolan’s wish for the franchise to be more involved with programs like this one, as well as the recent push in promoting women’s sports, Davidson is excited for the Rangers’ involvement.

“[I know it’s important] because I have two daughters,” Davidson told The Post. “I know when my daughters grew up in Westchester, there was not what you’d term opportunity much then. They played a lot of soccer and a lot of field hockey, basketball, and now to see the [hockey] opportunity that this is going to be in front of these kids, it’s awesome.”

Davidson said he wanted to make clear this program won’t be about just learning how to skate or handle a puck. The girls who come through the Rangers’ program will learn how to play as part of a team, how to compete and do it the right way.

Davidson, a Rangers goaltender from 1975-83 and, after his playing career, a color commentator from the mid-1980s to the mid-2000s, considers Kessel’s résumé to be more than fitting for an ambassador of the sport.

Kessel was contacted by the Rangers this past spring, with the club asking if she would be interested in spearheading the initiative. It didn’t take her long to say yes, knowing there wasn’t anything like this available to her when she was younger.

The Wisconsin native said she sees the need for opportunities like Junior Rangers Girls Hockey. When she is coaching all-girls hockey camps, Kessel said she talks with young girls who have never been around so many female hockey players.

Amanda’s brother, Phil Kessel of the Coyotes, said he believes his sister has it in her blood to help the sport grow. Phil and Blake, who last season played for the Maine Mariners in the ECHL, always considered their sister to be one of the guys — especially since she was just as good as they were athletically, if not better.

“I always tell people this: Amanda can probably play any sport she chooses to play,” Phil told The Post. “Whatever she did, she was always the best player around at all the sports. She just loved hockey more than anything.

“I think she’s outgoing and she knows the sport well. She knows it better than most people know the sport,” he added. “I think she’s passionate about — I think she cares, and people can learn a lot from her.”

Throughout her career, Amanda has experienced a lot — from a severe concussion that kept her out of hockey for about two years, to her 2018 Olympic gold that followed a silver medal in the 2014 Sochi Games, and to three additional gold medals in IIHF World Women’s Championship competition.

She also witnessed her friends and former teammates’ lives get turned upside down when the Canadian Women’s Hockey League folded at the end of March. Kessel said she and several other players in the National Women’s Hockey League, which is now the only pro hockey league for women in North America, have decided to hold off on playing until a new, more sustainable league comes into existence.

“I think we’re at a point where we need a fresh start of a league. I think what needs to be done is get under the NHL’s umbrella and have them help with marketing and exposure,” Kessel said. “At least right now, a lot of hockey fans don’t even know that there was a professional women’s league.”

It wasn’t a hard decision.

Kessel became the highest-paid women’s hockey player in 2016 when she inked a deal with the NWHL’s New York Riveters for $26,000 — light-years from Phil’s annual average salary of $8 million in the NHL.

In the 2016-17 season, Kessel’s jersey led the NWHL in apparel sales. Her last contract, with the NWHL’s Metropolitan Riveters, was undisclosed. But even though she was fresh from leading Team USA to its first Olympic women’s hockey gold medal in 20 years, there probably wasn’t much of a pay bump.

In March 2017, Kessel and other female players boycotted the International Ice Hockey Federation world championship, in the hope of equal treatment with the men’s team. The U.S. women’s national soccer team did something similar just before them.

The push for equal pay in women’s sports was given a more prominent face in March, when the USWNT, the eventual 2019 Women’s World Cup champions, filed a lawsuit under the Equal Pay Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act claiming gender discrimination against U.S. Soccer, with 28 members of the women’s team named as plaintiffs in the case.

“It’s pretty amazing [what they’ve done]. I think they’re a team that everybody has looked up to,” Kessel said of her compatriots in women’s sports. “They’re outspoken on a lot of issues, and I know when we were going through our battle for equality with USA Hockey and working to have changes, they were a team that we kind of looked to, because they’ve been at the forefront of it all. I think they’re just very inspiring.”

Kessel said she hopes to provide that same kind of inspiration through Junior Rangers Girls Hockey. Her hope is to see an increase in participation and retention numbers. And both Kessel and Davidson, aware of how the USWNT captivated the nation with their back-to-back World Cup wins, hope to elevate the sport of hockey to that kind of level.

The sky is the limit for the Rangers’ program, according to Davidson, who hopes many people take advantage of the opportunities it will present.

“Sports should be all-inclusive. Period. No ifs, ands or buts or anything,” Davidson said. “It’s just what it is. Sports has a lot to offer if people get involved and do it the right way. It’s a very strong part of life, for the health of life, it’s a wonderful thing.”