The news greeting the Rangers, upon their return from their winter recess, that Kaapo Kakko would remain sidelined for at least another month with an unspecified upper body injury surely adds certainty — and some urgency — to president-general manager Chris Drury’s quest to acquire a top-six right winger before the March 21 trade deadline. 

The Blueshirts revealed little about the issue, which has sidelined Kakko since he left the Garden ice following the Jan. 22 pregame warm-up and which kept him out of the club’s final six games before the break. Head coach Gerard Gallant had laid out a somewhat specific timeline of a month before Kakko would be able to return (whether to the lineup or practice is unclear), so it is safe to infer that the winger is undergoing surgery. 

The Post has learned that this injury is unrelated to the suspected concussion that sidelined him for four games in late October. Kakko had skated on his own a handful of times prior to the break, with the Blueshirts hopeful the ailment would respond to treatment, but that obviously has not been the case. 

Before leaving the lineup, Kakko had played 23 straight games on the line with Chris Kreider and Mika Zibanejad. And though he had recorded only two goals and seven assists over that span, with both goals coming at Arizona on Dec. 15, Gallant lauded the winger’s work. 

“Kakko is a real good defensive player. He was playing fine,” the coach said. “He wasn’t scoring as much as he likes, but I liked his game. He’s an intelligent player, he’s played a lot with the top lines and he’s trending in the right direction. 

“There’s nothing I didn’t like about him all year. He would just like to score more, we would like to see him score a little bit more but we liked his game. He was playing with two players who are having great seasons in Kreider and Zibanejad and was solid with them.” 

Kakko has played all but one of his 37 games on either Zibanejad’s line or Ryan Strome’s unit. In other words, a top-six staple. And while he has gone only a disappointing 5-9-14 on the season, he has the best five-on-five, on-ice goals-for percentage of any Rangers forward at 59.38 (19 for, 13 against). Ryan Lindgren (33, 22) leads the team at 60 percent. 

Alexis Lafreniere has moved up to the right side with Zibanejad and Kreider the last three games, so Gallant could have slotted Kakko with Strome and Artemi Panarin while allowing Drury and the hierarchy to get a 16-game trial run into the deadline with both of the club’s lottery kids in the top six. That has happened nine times this year. 

But now, not. The Rangers’ options to fill Kakko’s spot are Dryden Hunt, Barclay Goodrow and Filip Chytil. Moving Goodrow into the top six would severely weaken the third line. Gallant doesn’t seem overly enthused about shifting Chytil to right wing on the Strome unit. And Hunt, who has already gotten 15 games with Strome and Panarin, is a nominal fourth-liner being tasked with playing up. 

“I haven’t thought about the lines, yet,” said Gallant, who put the Rangers through a conditioning skate in the team’s first time on the ice since Feb. 1. “Honestly, I haven’t.” 

Maybe the Rangers can get by for a spell, as they did in going 4-2 since Kakko left the lineup. But probably not long term, and certainly not in the playoffs. And it is difficult to project what effect this extended absence will have on Kakko, who will turn 21 on Sunday. By the way, this may even complicate negotiations on Kakko’s second contract, but that is for a little bit later. 

Drury was all along expected to try to acquire a top-six wing, with much of the focus on Vancouver’s J.T. Miller. The GM has chips to play, with Nils Lundkvist at the top of the chart. Now, with one top-six right wing down for another month and another still attempting to adapt to playing his off-wing for the first time in his life, Drury doesn’t really have the five weeks to wait until the deadline.