The message was written on the board when the Indiana Pacers arrived for their meeting at Conseco Fieldhouse late Friday afternoon.

The message from coach Jim O’Brien said: “Just play with the defensive intensity you did the last nine minutes against New York and everything else will fall into place.”

Mission accomplished.

The Pacers brought their defense back with them from New York and used it to beat the Washington Wizards 102-86 on the 10th anniversary of the opening of the fieldhouse.

“That’s huge,” Pacers point guard T.J. Ford said. “It gives us a lot of confidence knowing we don’t have to worry about scoring. The scoring will come; we just have to continue to play defense like we’re doing.”

The Pacers, who have won two straight after losing their first three games, forced 19 turnovers and held the Wizards to 39 percent shooting.

Going back to the fourth quarter of Wednesday’s game at New York, the Pacers have held their opponents to 34.6 percent shooting in the past five quarters.

“We’ve gotten in a groove and now we need to extend it,” Pacers forward Danny Granger said. “The ball’s in the paint and we’re attacking it, getting our hands on it. We’re blocking shots and not giving up easy layups.”

Pacers center Roy Hibbert is making things easier for the perimeter players, doing a better job protecting the paint for a defense that has struggled the past few seasons.

The second-year center had 12 points, 11 rebounds and five blocks for his third straight double-double.

“I feel like we’re turning the corner defensively,” Pacers guard Dahntay Jones said. “We’re trusting each other and Roy is doing a good job controlling the paint. We’ve got bigs that want to get in and scrap.”

As they did in New York, the Pacers played their best defense in the fourth quarter.

The Pacers held the Wizards without a field goal for nearly a six-minute span in the final quarter. Washington, which has explosive scorers Gilbert Arenas and Caron Butler, went 0-of-10 from the field during that stretch.

Butler led the Wizards with 24 points, but the Pacers forced him to take 21 shots to reach that total.

The Pacers stretched a 14-point lead to a 22-point cushion during Washington’s drought from the field.

O’Brien constantly instructed his team to continue to get defensive stops and to push the ball up the court offensively.

O’Brien met his team out on the court to congratulate them after Granger’s 3-pointer gave them a 91-71 lead, forcing Wizards coach Flip Saunders to call a timeout.

“I’m very disappointed,” Saunders said. “Our effort was poor. As a team, we dug ourselves a hole. We didn’t play hard or with intelligence.”

Granger led five Pacers in double figures with 22 points. Ford had 18 points, 10 rebounds and no turnovers.

Forward Tyler Hansbrough, who was limited to a maximum of 16 minutes, made an impression in his first game of the season. The rookie out of North Carolina had 13 points, including 7-of-10 from the free throw line, and five rebounds in 14 minutes.

“I had a couple of jitters with it being my first time on the NBA stage,” Hansbrough said. “I just tried to get in the flow of the game. I got to attack the rim, I was aggressive and I got to the foul line.”

[chart]
|||FG|FT|Reb||||
|Washington|Min|M-A|M-A|O-T|A|PF|Pts|
|Butler|36:21|8-21|7-9|4-12|0|1|24|
|Oberto|11:03|1-1|0-0|0-0|2|5|2|
|Haywood|35:29|4-9|1-3|8-19|0|3|9|
|Arenas|35:05|5-10|2-4|0-2|5|4|13|
|Young|15:03|1-4|0-0|0-2|0|3|3|
|Blatche|15:28|0-5|1-2|1-3|1|4|1|
|Foye|34:17|6-14|2-2|0-4|2|0|16|
|Stevenson|15:38|1-3|0-0|0-0|0|1|2|
|McGee|7:06|2-4|0-0|1-1|1|1|4|
|McGuire|7:53|1-2|0-2|1-3|0|0|2|
|James|22:03|2-8|2-4|0-1|3|1|6|
|Davis|4:34|2-3|0-0|0-0|2|0|4|
|Totals||33-84|15-26|15-47|16|23|86|
[end chart]

Percentages: FG .393, FT .577. 3-Point Goals: 5-16, .313 (Foye 2-5, Arenas 1-1, Young 1-2, Butler 1-5, James 0-1, Stevenson 0-2). Team Rebounds: 11. Team Turnovers: 19 (22 pts). Blocked Shots: 8 (Haywood 4, Blatche 2, Davis, Young). Turnovers: 19 (Arenas 3, Butler 3, Haywood 3, Foye 2, McGuire 2, Oberto 2, Blatche, James, McGee, Stevenson). Steals: 4 (Arenas, Haywood, James, Stevenson). Technical Foul: Defensive three second, 5:47 first.

[chart]
|||FG|FT|Reb||||
|Indiana|Min|M-A|M-A|O-T|A|PF|Pts|
|DJones|40:22|6-11|6-9|1-5|5|5|18|
|Granger|36:20|7-21|5-5|0-6|2|1|22|
|Hibbert|27:52|5-9|2-2|6-11|2|5|12|
|Ford|40:01|6-15|6-6|3-10|4|0|18|
|Rush|14:48|1-4|0-0|1-2|0|0|2|
|Hansbrough|13:49|3-7|7-10|2-5|1|3|13|
|SJones|20:08|0-4|0-2|1-8|2|3|0|
|Watson|32:00|2-7|1-2|0-4|3|4|7|
|Price|11:25|2-4|0-0|0-0|0|1|6|
|McRoberts|3:15|2-3|0-0|0-0|0|1|4|
|Totals||34-85|27-36|14-51|19|23|102|
[end chart]

Percentages: FG .400, FT .750. 3-Point Goals: 7-23, .304 (Granger 3-11, Price 2-4, Watson 2-5, Ford 0-1, Rush 0-2). Team Rebounds: 13. Team Turnovers: 13 (11 pts). Blocked Shots: 10 (Hibbert 5, Granger 2, D.Jones, S.Jones, Watson). Turnovers: 11 (Hibbert 4, Granger 2, D.Jones 2, Watson 2, S.Jones). Steals: 12 (Granger 4, Ford 2, D.Jones 2, Rush 2, Price, Watson). Technical Foul: Defensive three second, 1:59 third.

[chart]
||||||||
|Washington|19|22|24|21|—|86|
|Indiana|23|30|29|20|—|102|
[end chart]

A—14,556 (18,165). T—2:12. Officials—Joe DeRosa, David Jones, Marat Kogut.