HBO Max's 95% Rotten Tomatoes Breakout Renewed for Season 2
Heated Rivalry is skating into Season 2 at Crave and HBO Max after hitting a Certified Fresh 95% on Rotten Tomatoes—an early pickup coming with Season 1 only four episodes into its six-episode run.
Heated Rivalry is not waiting for the final buzzer. Crave and HBO Max have already called for Season 2 while Season 1 is still mid-stride. Four of the six episodes are out, the show is sitting pretty at 95% on Rotten Tomatoes, and the streamer clearly liked what it saw.
The renewal announcement
Stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie dropped the news in a quick video posted to HBO Max's X account on December 12, 2025. Williams tossed out a promise that feels very on-brand for this sweat-soaked hockey romance:
"Hotter, wetter, and longer."
What Season 2 is shaping up to be
Williams and Storrie will be back as Shane Hollander and Ilya Grigoryevich Rozanov, rival superstars in Major League Hockey who keep a relationship off the ice under wraps. The core of the show is still that push-pull: two of the league's biggest names tied together by ambition and rivalry, sneaking into a fling as rookies that stretches across eight years as it becomes an actual relationship, complete with denial, growth, and the awkward question of whether there is any room for love in a brutally competitive sport.
The cast you will see
- Hudson Williams as Shane Hollander
- Connor Storrie as Ilya Grigoryevich Rozanov
- François Arnaud as Scott Hunter
- Robbie G.K. as Christopher 'Kip' Grady
- Christina Chang as Yuna Hollander
- Dylan Walsh as David Hollander
- Sophie Nélisse as Rose Landry
- Ksenia Daniela Kharlamova as Svetlana Vetrova
Behind the scenes (and the playbook)
Jacob Tierney is pulling quadruple duty again as creator, writer, director, and executive producer. If that name rings a bell, he also created the hockey-adjacent sitcom Letterkenny. The series is based on Rachel Reid's Game Changers novels, and Storrie said in the announcement video that Season 2 will adapt The Long Game, which is the final book in Reid's series. That is a pretty intriguing move for book readers keeping track of how the adaptation is mapping the timeline.
Where to watch
Heated Rivalry is made for Crave in Canada, with HBO Max distributing it in the U.S. and Australia.
Bottom line: the show is thriving mid-season, it has the Certified Fresh badge to prove it, and the team is already skating into a bigger, splashier Season 2.