Will There Be a ‘Heated Rivalry’ Season 3? New Updates About the Show’s Future
What To Know
- Crave’s Heated Rivalry has been officially confirmed for Season 2.
- Lead actors Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams have signed on for three seasons.
- Heated Rivalry author Rachel Reid will publish a third book about Shane and Ilya in 2026.
Heated Rivalry fans just keep winning. First, Crave’s hockey romance show skyrocketed in popularity almost as soon as it debuted on HBO Max, prompting its quick Season 2 renewal. With more Season 2 news coming out every day, we’ve hardly had time to catch our breath, let alone start thinking about a potential Season 3.
Given the latest development, a third season is well within reach. Rachel Reid, who wrote the books the show is based on, is following up Shane and Ilya’s Heated Rivalry and The Long Game with a third book. Unrivaled will hit shelves in September 2026, which would give creator Jacob Tierney plenty of time to adapt it for TV.
The most pressing question on our minds used to be: “When will Season 2 come out?” Now, we have a (very likely) third installment to consider. When GQ profiled Heated Rivalry stars Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams, they confirmed that both actors had signed on for not two, but three seasons. Tierney also referenced a third season when talking about how Heated Rivalry will explore team dynamics in the future. “Another thing that will be interesting to explore in Season 2 and 3 is the different ways that allyship can happen,” he added during an appearance on the What Chaos! show. “You know, the different ways that people can show up to support you.”
Does all of that mean Heated Rivalry Season 3 is a given? Swooon has all the latest updates below.
Will there be a Heated Rivalry Season 3?
We shouldn’t get too ahead of ourselves — Crave has only greenlit a second season officially. It’s surely a good sign, though, that the two leads’ contracts include a third season. It likely all depends on how well Season 2, which will likely come out in 2027, performs.
What would Heated Rivalry Season 3 be about?
It’s been confirmed that Tierney will adapt The Long Game in Season 2, but he’s optioned Reid’s entire Game Changers series, per c21 Media, not just Heated Rivalry and its sequel. In fact, he said in that interview that he got the rights to all seven books, before it was revealed in January 2026 that Reid would continue Shane and Ilya’s story in Unrivaled. (Did he already know that Reid had a third book up her sleeve? Who’s to say?)
That gives Tierney a lot of material to work with if Heated Rivalry is renewed for Season 3. He could split The Long Game into two parts, as many fans have suggested, or incorporate the other couples in Reid’s universe into the show to extend the story. He told Swooon that Shane and Ilya are “always going to be the focus of the show… This is the thing that is going to anchor the show, no matter how long the future is and no matter how many seasons we actually get.”
[Warning: The below contains spoilers for The Long Game by Rachel Reid.]
Tierney could also assign a book to each respective season, using Unrivaled for Season 3. Reid has confirmed that it will play out over the course of Shane and Ilya’s first season playing for the Ottawa Centaurs as a married couple. They’ll face a divided hockey world, receiving support and backlash in response to their now-public relationship.
However, we’re (once again) getting ahead of ourselves. We can predict the plot of a future Heated Rivalry Season 3 all day long, but the reality is that we likely won’t get an update on the show’s future until Season 2 arrives or is about to come out. Make your guesses in the comments below anyway!
Heated Rivalry, Season 2, TBA, HBO Max
