They have made it three wins on the trot, beating Moana Pasifika 45-17 with a sublime second half performance at Mt Smart Stadium, on Friday night.
Moana Pasifika were a shadow of the team that lost 59-0 to the Hurricanes last week, but it was the final quarter where the Highlander ran rampant.
Folau Fakatava injected energy off the bench, setting up two tries for Mosese Dawai and replacement No 8 Marino Mikaele-Tu’u, and Thomas Umaga-Jensen fended three players to score.
In the forwards, Hugh Renton and Sean Withy were robust and Ethan de Groot was huge for the dominant scrum.
It was a really pleasing second half performance from the Highlanders taking a much-needed bonus point win.
But they were ill-disciplined early, coughing up ball in the first five minutes through a flurry of errors.
Moana Pasifika pounced, with captain Solomone Funaki scoring and led 7-0.
The visitors brushed off the mistakes to strike back.
Pari Pari Parkinson, held up metres from the line, lapped his levers over Moana Pasifika’s defence to score.
That gave the Highlanders more momentum on attack and a huge scrum, forcing Moana Pasifika to collapse over the sideline, made a statement.
They used the width of the field to shift the ball through multiple phases, with some strong carries from the forwards, before the backs stole the show.
Mitch Hunt, who took the ball to the line beautifully, drew in a couple of defenders and popped it out to Sam Gilbert who charged through to score.
Gilbert converted his own to give the Highlanders its first lead of the game, 12-7.
The rest of the half resembled something of a ping-pong match.
Moana Pasifika centre Levi Aumua changed his angle from a wrap-around ball and steamrolled through three defenders to score.
That returned the lead to the home side, but, as it did before, it failed to push on and let the Highlanders back in through the loose forwards.
Withy offloaded in the tackle to Parkinson, who side-stepped through tackles, flicked it up to Renton who banged it down over the line and sneak in front.
But the Highlanders followed Moana Pasifika’s book and let them back in through a penalty, to trail by two.
Moana Pasifika had another opportunity when Aumua took off down the park and threw it wide for Timoci Tavatavanawai.
He was on to score until Fetuli Paea held him up in a try saving tackle and his forwards arrived to turn it over, giving them a 19-17 lead at the break.
The Highlanders had a much better start to the second half and got themselves 10m from the line.
The forwards had some robust carries, transferring the ball in the tackle, and Paea hit Smith’s ball at pace and scored.
Deadly from broken play, Moana Pasifika dashed up the field, flicking the ball through multiple hands until Ereatara Enari was caught in front of the line by Jonah Lowe.
Lowe was sent to the bin for not releasing, a huge call in the context of the tight game.
Highlanders captain Billy Harmon argued Enari knocked it on and the TMO agreed.
Lowe’s yellow card was reversed, cantering back on to the field with a beaming smile, and the forwards had a big scrum to protect the ball and gain territory down the park.
The Highlanders then ran away in the final quarter to secure the win for Smith’s 350th first-class game.
