Florida Panthers defenseman Aaron Ekblad has been suspended two games for elbowing Tampa Bay Lightning forward Brandon Hagel in Monday’s 4-2 Panthers win in Game 4 of the teams’ first-round Stanley Cup playoffs series, the NHL’s Department of Player Safety announced Tuesday.

Ekblad, who scored the game-tying goal on Monday as part of a spurt of two goals in 11 seconds late in the third period, will not suit up when the teams play Game 5 on Wednesday at Tampa’s Amalie Arena and either Game 6 (if the series extends that far) or the first game of the Panthers’ second-round playoff series. Florida leads the best-of-7 series with Tampa Bay 3-1 and needs just one more win to advance to the second round.

Monday was just Ekblad’s second game back in the Panthers’ lineup after serving a 20-game suspension for violating the terms of the NHL and NHLPA performance enhancing substances program.

With less than nine minutes left in the second period, shortly after the Panthers took a 1-0 lead, Hagel played the puck out of the Tampa Bay zone. Ekblad skated in on him at the boards and delivered a hit with his right forearm that made contact with Hagel’s head and shoved Hagel down in the process.

Ekblad was not issued a penalty for the hit. Hagel did not return to the game after that and already has been ruled out for Game 5.

“He’s not playing tomorrow,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said Tuesday. “There it is, and you know why.”

It was the latest controversial hit in the series and the second that has resulted in a suspension.

Hagel was suspended for Game 3 following a high hit on Aleksander Barkov away from the puck in third period of Game 2 that resulted in a five-minute major penalty for interference and was what the Department of Player Safety deemed to be “an extremely forceful body check to an unsuspecting opponent with sufficient force.”

Star Panthers winger Matthew Tkachuk also received a five-minute major penalty for interference in Game 3 when he laid a late hit on Lightning forward Jake Guentzel late in the third period. Tkachuk did not receive supplemental discipline from the league because the hit on Guentzel came after the Lightning forward played the puck and did not involve contact to the head.

Neither Cooper nor Panthers coach Paul Maurice wanted to talk about the Ekblad hit postgame.

“It’s getting tiresome answering questions about a hit every single game,’’ Cooper said. “Let’s move on.’’

Added Maurice: “I want to be consistent with what I said on the Hagel [hit]. I saw it. I’ve seen it before. I’ll coach, the players will play, the refs will make the calls, and the league will do what they will with it. I don’t want to use this platform to start making my case on this. Everybody’s got a job to do. I’ll stay in my lane.”

With Ekblad out for Game 5, defenseman Uvis Balinskis will most likely draw back into the lineup for Florida’s first chance to clinch the series.

Niko Mikkola fined

In addition to the Ekblad suspension, the NHL Department of Player Safety also fined Panthers defenseman Niko Mikkola $5,000, the maximum allowed under the league’s collective bargaining agreement, for boarding Lightning forward Zemgus Girgensons in the opening minute of the third period Monday.

Mikkola received a five-minute major penalty and a game misconduct for the play.

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