A second successive bonus-point win over Benetton Rugby took them up to 12 points in the pool and back into the running for a quarter-final spot with games to come against Bath and Toulon.
“We really wanted to nail this one to keep alive our chances in both tournaments,” said Pivac in the wake of his side’s 31-12 victory in Treviso. “Now we will look forward to travelling to Bath in January after the regional derbies – it is going to be a big occasion.”
Two tries from Wales scrum half Gareth Davies and others from Johnny McNicholl and Paul Asquith carried the Scarlets to victory against their Guinness PRO14 rivals.
“We weren’t happy with our defence or our physicality in defence last week and so that was a big focus for us all week in the build up to the return,” added Pivac.
“At 31-0, with the game done and dusted, it was job done. There was a big turnaround in attitude from the players and you could see that in the way they kept tapping each other on the back and encouraging each other.
“That was testament to the team spirit within the group. When you think that we were without six leading players who would normally start for us, and we came to a difficult place like this, scored four tries and gave everyone a run, it is very satisfying.
“The players were all commenting after the game how enjoyable it was and perhaps what we learned more than anything was that you can’t afford to be complacent when you are playing at home.
“I was pleased that we stuck to our plan and were a lot more clinical than last week. I think we learned a lot from that game and I was happy with the way we took our chances.
“The pitch was a bit heavy underfoot and I think on a drier day we might have scored a few more. We would have liked to have kept them scoreless, but by the time they got those two tries the game had broken up, we had emptied the bench, the game was won and we just wanted to get the players into the dressing room to give them a pat on the back for a job well done.”
