The path to No. 1, Malik Nabers says, was strewn with pressure.

So whatever was added onto the pile by getting the Giants to bring Ray Flaherty’s number out of retirement — with Nabers being the first to wear it since 1947 — that’s more than welcome.

“I had pressure my whole life,” Nabers said following Thursday’s practice. “Made it outta a lot of situations with pressure. I feel like I like pressure. I’m happy that it’s on me. I guess if everybody puts pressure on me, then it’s good.”

Nabers will make his NFL debut a week from Sunday against the Vikings, but the hype around the LSU product already feels a little like another first-round receiver from the same school a decade ago.

It took five weeks into that season for Odell Beckham Jr. to burst onto the scene after an injury kept him out for the first month.

It took seven weeks for him to etch himself into the NFL’s forever highlight reel with an astonishing end-zone catch on a Sunday night against the Cowboys.

Nabers’ arc will be different, but it is building up to a boiling point before he’s played a regular-season game.

You don’t call up one of the franchise’s royal families asking to take a number out of retirement for just anyone.

And the Giants wouldn’t have done it if they didn’t believe Nabers could handle the extra attention and expectation now on his shoulders. Not that there wasn’t a lot of it already.

“I think he’s done a real good job,” Andrew Thomas, a former top-five pick with the Giants, told The Post of Nabers. “He’s just come in, does his work, tries to stay out of the media and things of that nature. He’s working hard, trying to learn the playbook. … He’s done a great job of that.”

Thomas, picked fourth overall out of Georgia in 2020, dealt with pressure and expectation with the Bulldogs — as high profile a program as exists in college football.

But getting to the NFL and getting to New York took things to another level.

“That was my first time struggling that much,” said Thomas, who has since become the dominant left tackle the Giants envisioned. “So I had to take it to another level as far as locking in and not letting the noise affect me.”

Nabers hasn’t yet stumbled, but that will come, and he admitted that upon taking the field for the preseason opener against the Texans, he felt like the game was “really fast.”

“It was like all that practice stuff, it’s slow right now, but the game speed’s fast,” Nabers said. “When I first got out there, I wasn’t sure what I was getting myself into, but I had a talk with some people. I was like, ‘The game’s really fast. It’s faster than college for sure.’ ”

He’s leaned on Darius Slayton, a leader in the receivers’ room, for questions and advice.

“He took me under his wing, showed me a lot of stuff that goes on with coverages and stuff like that,” Nabers said. “I’m taking that as being a pro. Going to talk to him, asking him questions, trying to get ahead of the game.”

There will be more learning to come in the regular season. The game will be faster still. The expectation on Nabers will only go in one direction: up.

The Giants believe he can handle it. So does Nabers.

“I don’t really like talking about myself a lot [but] I believe I’m just a dog,” Nabers said. “When I’m out there on the field, I just want to be a dog. Be a difference-maker, be a player my coaches can count on.”