Treviso rugby team was founded in and has won 15 Italian national championships. The team has been owned by the Benetton clothing company since Treviso have competed in the United Rugby Championship formerly the Pro14 and Pro12 since , and have previously competed in the Italian domestic championship. Treviso have supplied many players to the Italian national team , such as Alessandro Zanni and Leonardo Ghiraldini. Since , the club has also had a women's team, known as Red Panthers , which has won 16 national championships.
Treviso rugby team was founded in The club won its first honour when it took the Italian premiership. Benetton Treviso won its first Italian Cup in and in won the Italian premiership again. The year after Benetton became the main sponsor, the team's name became "Benetton Rugby Treviso". Treviso won the domestic premiership in , then again in and in the season. Benetton Treviso Rugby turned professional after They dominated the Italian league from until , winning the championship 10 times , , , , , , , , and during those 14 seasons and twice finishing second.
Benetton Treviso has competed in the Heineken Cup competition almost every year since the competition began in along with the professional era. Benetton Treviso competed in the inaugural —96 Heineken Cup , winning one game and losing one. The following season they played four matches, winning one game. In the —99 Heineken Cup, they won three games. Benetton Treviso spent the —01 and —03 seasons in the European Challenge Cup , but have appeared in the Heineken Cup in each season since then.
They won half of their games during the —05 Heineken Cup, but won only one match in the following four seasons at Newport Gwent Dragons in Following the —10 season, Treviso left the Italian domestic competition and in —11 was one of two Italian teams to join the Celtic League to play against clubs from Ireland, Wales and Scotland. The new league was to be known as the Pro Both Italian teams were guaranteed places annually into the Heineken Cup, which had previously been awarded to the two top teams in the domestic Italian National Championship of Excellence.
In , it was proposed that Aironi and a new team, Praetorians Roma , would join, [ 4 ] but Treviso were nominated instead. Treviso and a combination of Duchi Nord-Ovest rugby clubs could not agree to form one regional representative club and lost out in the first round of bidding. Treviso finished their first two season in the Pro12 —11 and —12 in 10th place, while in the —13 season they finished 7th with 50 points. In the next three seasons, Treviso performed poorly, ending 11th, 11th and 12th out of twelve teams.
