The 28-year-old Edinburgh centre has been named in the starting XV in the only change in personnel from last weekend's 32-14 loss to Ireland, a game he had to withdraw from in the warm-up due to a hamstring problem.
Now De Luca, who has Italian ancestry and was once courted by Viadana and Treviso, is aiming to put on a strong display in a 72,000-seat stadium more renowned for Serie A football than Six Nations rugby.
"It's a great arena and I look forward to hopefully putting on a show," he said.
The venue was built for the 1960 Olympic Games and has hosted four European Cup finals and the 1990 football World Cup final and has taken over as the home of the Azzurri from the Stadio Flaminio, which is currently undergoing refurbishment.
De Luca recalls watching Channel 4 programme Football Italia in his youth and followed Lazio, Roma and Juventus - the latter "just because (Alessandro) Del Piero was there".
Lazio, who play at the Stadio Olimpico, were De Luca's chosen side, until he realised the right-wing politics of the club's ultras, and he liked watching combative midfielder Dejan Stankovic because "he quite often wore a face mask because he broke his cheek".
De Luca, who scored a try in last season's 21-8 win at Murrayfield which saw Scotland avoid the wooden spoon, is keen to show his defensive ability on Saturday against a strong Italy side.
He added: "I'll be looking to bring my energy, my defence and my skills in attack back to the team and hopefully we can start ticking again.
"Our defence has got to be huge. They've got some big ball carriers and as a 13 I see myself as setting an example, so I'll be looking to do that."
Scotland's defence was caught out in De Luca's absence in Dublin and he and the players are keen to respond, particularly in defence coach Graham Steadman's final match in the role.
"As a good send off to him (Steadman) we want to nail this side," De Luca added.
Further coaching changes are afoot, with Scotland attack coach Gregor Townsend moving to Glasgow Warriors next season.
De Luca says the players are determined to end the campaign on a high.
He said: "We owe it to ourselves and to them (the coaches) to get a result this week.
"We have to give everything for the full 80 minutes if we want to get a result in Rome.
"We've gone into the last game a lot without a win and got it.
"We're confident in our ability. Italy are a quality side but we have to be confident we can go out and get a result."
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