The Houston Texans traded with the Arizona Cardinals to select two-time unanimous All-American Will Anderson Jr. with the third choice in the NFL Draft on April 27.

The Texans targeted Anderson after he recorded 34.5 sacks and 58.5 tackles for loss at Alabama, and he delivered a sack for Houston in his NFL debut on Sunday.

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How big a deal was that?

When Anderson took down Baltimore quarterback Lamar Jackson for a 6-yard loss on a third-and-10 snap from the Ravens 43-yard line with 10:36 to play, he became the first rookie in franchise history to record a sack in a season-opening game.

“Will has been who he’s been all training camp, all preseason,” Texans coach DeMeco Ryans said. “He continues to cause havoc in the backfield. Got to the quarterback a couple of times, and as we all know, Lamar is a tough out.”

In Houston’s 25-9 loss to Baltimore, Anderson also made six tackles and registered two quarterback hits. He started at defensive end and played 48 snaps, which was 75 percent of the Texans’ defensive plays.

“It was a little faster Sunday,” Anderson said on Monday about his first NFL regular-season game. “Of course, I was out there a little longer, too. Like, you played the whole game. In preseason, you probably played around nine snaps, so just to get that game-game feel back under me, it felt really great just to be out there with the guys again. …

“I usually walk the field, and I usually warm up. But on Sunday, it was a different type of feeling. I walked out there, and I looked up and it finally hit me: You’re really in the NFL. So that kind of got all my nerves and everything out the way so when we suited up, got together as a team and walked out, I was fine.”

Although Houston lost, the Texans limited Baltimore to 265 yards, had two takeaways and recorded four sacks.

“I think we’re almost there,” Anderson said. “We got the brick, now we just got to keep putting the cement on the brick and keep stacking and keep building. I feel like as a defense, we had a really good game. There’s some things we can get better on, but the fight, the hunger, the relentless mindset we have on defense, I seen it on (Sunday). We want to be great; we want to win.”

Houston will open the home portion of its 2023 schedule on Sunday, when the Indianapolis Colts visit NRG Stadium at noon CDT for an AFC South game.

“I’m really excited — first home game,” Anderson said. “We want all the fans to come out. We want to have it rocking. We just ask all of y’all to be cheering for us. Just to have all that noise out here, it really helps us a lot.”

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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.