This Montreal-based hockey romance series has everyone talking — and a new season is coming
No one had this on their 2025 bingo card.
'Heated Rivalry' has been a surprise hit.
If you've been swept up by the Heated Rivalry hype, you know just how much this steamy hockey-based romance series is leaving fans flustered left, right and centre.
And this week, "Hollanov" shippers received an early holiday gift with the announcement that Crave is doing a second Heated Rivalry season following the runaway success of the first four episodes, which made it the "#1 Crave Original Series debut of all time."
Created by Jacob Tierney, (Letterkenny, Shoresy), Heated Rivalry tells the story of the secret romance between two star players, complicated by their rivalry on the ice and the pressure of being high-profile athletes in a sport that's yet to have its first out Queer player.
With plenty of action taking place in Montreal, the show has a particularly local flavour, with landmarks like the Olympic Stadium, Bell Centre and Notre-Dame Basilica of Montreal setting the scene.
Based on Rachel Reid's book of the same name, Heated Rivalry debuted on November 28 with two episodes, "Rookies" and "Olympians," both focused on the professional hockey debuts of Canadian Shane Hollander (Hudson Williams) and Russian Ilya Rozanov (Connor Storrie).
Episode three, "Hunter," is a somewhat side-quest story from another Reid book in the same universe, Game Changer, which broadens the show's lore and explores another perspective.
The series' latest episode, "Rose," returns to Hollander and Rozanov (aka Hollanov), now firmly established players and captains of their respective Major League Hockey (MLH) teams, the Montreal Metros and the Boston Raiders, trying to navigate their intensifying feelings while remaining secret and battling for "the Cup."
The announcement of a second season came on the same day as episode four dropped, with two more episodes to go in season one.
So far, the series has gained widespread praise for being a particularly faithful adaptation with an impactful soundtrack and captivating cinematography.
The success of the show has taken many people by surprise, not least of which is creator, writer and director Tierney, who recently told the What Chaos! podcast: "I don't think any of us expected this level of reaction."
For some, it might seem strange that pro hockey would be the setting for a Queer romance story, but the "M/M hockey romance" genre itself is well-established (Reid herself has written six books in the Game Changers series), as are its conventions of explicit sex scenes.
Suffice to say, don't watch it with your mom.
You can watch the final two episodes of Heated Rivalry season one on Crave, December 19 and December 26.
