Nick Nurse wants better rebounding. The Sixers’ answer? ‘Just hitting somebody.’

ORLANDO, Fla. — When asked about the 76ers’ primary focuses during Thursday’s practice, the first area Paul Reed mentioned was rebounding.

“What we can do better is just having more people helping out down there,” the backup center said. “Even if they’re not getting the rebound, just hitting somebody, just keeping their man off the glass.”

That is unsurprising, given perhaps the Sixers’ only statistical eyesore from Tuesday’s marquee 126-121 victory over the defending-champion Denver Nuggets was their 46-32 deficit on the glass. That included surrendering 16 offensive rebounds (11 by two-time NBA Most Valuable Player Nikola Jokic), which led to a 22-9 edge in second chance-points.

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That was not just a one-game blip for the Sixers, however. After ranking in the NBA’s top 7 in rebounding average, offensive rebounding percentage, and overall rebounding percentage in November, those numbers have fallen off in recent weeks. Over their last 15 games, the Sixers rank last in the league in rebounding (39.9 per game) and 29th in rebounding percentage (46.7).

“As usual, it needs a little bit of investigation,” coach Nick Nurse said when asked Thursday about the slippage. “There is a lot of good news on that front, but I think I’ll keep that to myself. … There’s a lot more long ones [we are not getting]. We’ve just got to do a better job of reacting to the next play.”

That the Sixers played without reigning MVP center Joel Embiid, who was sidelined with ankle and knee injuries, for seven of those games was certainly a factor. So was that they have recently faced some of the NBA’s best rebounding teams. The Utah Jazz, New York Knicks, and Houston Rockets all entered Thursday in the league’s top 10 in rebounding average, while the Knicks and Jazz are 1-2 in percentage and the Nuggets are sixth.

Still, improving this area has been a priority for Nurse since he became the Sixers’ coach last spring. The previous two seasons, his new team had ranked 26th and 29th in the league, respectively, in rebounding average.

“You’re thinking, ‘Well, jeez. Maybe we just don’t have good rebounders. Maybe guys just don’t anticipate where the ball’s going to be or don’t have a knack for rebounding,’” Nurse said. “Well, you can’t really accept that as a coach, right? You get to work.”

The Sixers entered the season with some intriguing individual rebounders. Embiid perennially averages double figures in that category, though that number dipped last season as he pushed his offensive touches further from the basket and perhaps did not prioritize being a dominant interior defender as much. De’Anthony Melton, whose fill-the-box-score style includes averaging four rebounds per game as a guard in his career, credits his high school coach with helping him learn to anticipate where the ball would fly off the rim. Tyrese Maxey this season has put more emphasis on crashing the boards, so he can immediately push the ball in transition. Reed quickly built a reputation as a high-effort rebounder, while Patrick Beverley has always been strong for his position despite his 6-foot-2 frame.

“That’s what all the NBA game is about: the rebounding game,” said Beverley, who has averaged 4.1 boards throughout his 12-year career. “A lot of people don’t talk about it. But most teams who win the rebounding game, really win the game.”

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Under Nurse, Melton said the Sixers have been “emphasizing flesh-on-flesh — which means just hitting people more, honestly.” More formally, Nurse said his staff has about 11 rebounding drills, sprinkling in a couple during each practice to prevent redundancy.

The most basic is the full-contact block-out. Then, staffers will set up more nuanced scenarios. One might be for a Sixer on the perimeter whose man gets back on defense instead of crashing, prompting the Sixer to quickly help a teammate “sandwich” to the opponent’s strongest rebounder on the front and back sides. Another might be purposefully creating a long rebound, to get players in the habit of running the ball down. Even while repping offensive sets against no defenders, players are required to finish with the “dynamics of crashing,” Nurse said, using his hands to describe where players should position themselves on the floor depending on where a shot is taken.

“It’s almost like Xs and Os,” Nurse said. “Who’s going this way? And who’s going that way? Just trying to build those habits of the reaction of, ‘There goes the shot. Are we alert enough to make an early move?’”

Early in the season, the Sixers aimed to balance gunning for offensive rebounds and getting back in transition. They entered Thursday ranked 26th in the NBA in opponent fastbreak points per game (15.6) overall this season, but have trimmed that to 15.1 over their past 15 games. Conversely, they ranked fourth in the NBA in offensive rebounding percentage in November (33.1) and have dropped slightly to 10th when surveying the entire season (30.1).

Yet the defensive rebounding, in Nurse’s words, “has to get better.” Though the “tagging” (aka the box out) has been collectively “decent,” the coach said, the pursuit for the ball in the air has not. On one possession against the Nuggets, for instance, Jamal Murray fired a wildly off-balance three-pointer but still somehow secured the offensive rebound, which led to a wide-open Reggie Jackson deep shot.

“It’s kind of like two plays,” Nurse said. “ … When it is going long, now your tag is over with and it turns into a footrace a lot of times.”

Those offensive rebounds are also where Jokic had a jarring advantage over Embiid while otherwise getting outperformed by his MVP counterpart. On one third-quarter putback, which cut the Sixers’ lead to 90-87, Embiid slammed the ball in clear frustration.

“I don’t know how he does it,” Nurse said. “He shoots it [and] he absolutely knows where it’s going to miss. He must be pushing off a little bit or something, because nobody can get those. You really need somebody to come from the other side of him athletically, and jump up and get those from the other side. Because whatever he’s doing to do to the guy in front of him isn’t working.

“The only rebound the guy in front of him has is the one that’s coming through the net. Somehow, that guy ends up down there every time. But [Jokic] doesn’t jump and he’s got really long arms and he’s got incredible timing to know where his misses are going.”

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Friday’s opponent, the Orlando Magic, do not feature the same type of rebounding master. Like the Sixers, they entered Thursday ranked in the middle of the pack of that statistical category, but in the top 10 in offensive rebounding percentage.

Which means bringing Thursday’s practice focus to the game remains a full-team responsibility.

“We’ve worked at it hard and improved those numbers a lot,” Nurse said. “But until you give up zero offensive rebounds and get like 18 yourself, you’re probably not going to have a perfect rebounding game. We’ll keep striving for that.”