Since storming onto the streaming scene on Nov. 28, Crave and HBO Max’s steamy gay hockey series Heated Rivalry is the talk of the town. People are obsessing over fictional hockey studs Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov, played respectively by series breakout stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie.

Scroll through TikTok, X and Instagram and you’ll probably find yourself buried in a wave of #Hollanov memes, angsty fan edits and passionate — some very NSFW — fan reactions to Shane and Ilya’s sexy love affair. Clips of the pair’s big moments, such as their tension-filled clubbing scene in Episode 4, and racy screenshots, like Shane’s back arch during a sex scene, have gone viral. Fans are devoting time to analyzing scenes in between episode drops, offering their own theories and interpretations.

“The show has very much become a force to be reckoned with,” B.J. Colangelo, entertainment journalist and media theorist, tells Yahoo.

Adapted by creator Jacob Tierney from Rachel Reid’s Game Changer romance novels, the series follows Shane and Ilya, two rival star players who begin a secret love affair that spans years.

The Canadian series peaked at No. 1 as HBO Max’s top TV show in the U.S. in its third week (Episode 5 drops Friday), and has stayed in the top three since its premiere. In Canada, it is Crave’s No. 1 original series debut ever; streaming viewership grew by almost 400% in its first seven days up north.

The paperback versions of Heated Rivalry, the second book in Reid’s series, and its follow-up, The Long Game, have been flying off shelves (and sometimes out of stock) for weeks on Amazon. The Kindle versions are currently the No. 1 and No. 4 bestsellers, respectively.

“There’s a clear pent-up appetite for romance,” Myles McNutt, associate professor of media studies at Old Dominion University and editor of Episodic Medium, tells Yahoo. “No one had ever done a serious adaptation of this kind of material. It’s clear there’s an audience for that. It’s an audience who has been underserved, who feel like the thing that they’re connected with isn’t being paid attention to. And to have that validated [and] lifted up [is powerful].”

Colangelo calls it the “perfect storm.”

“Hockey romance books have this massive baked-in fanbase,” she says. “Audiences, especially in America, are really starved for a show like this. … It’s not only refreshing to see a show that’s unafraid to say sex and sexuality are a major part of the human experience and does influence how we exist in the world, it’s being presented in a way that never feels preachy or educational.”

“This is a show where characters are allowed to yearn,” Colangelo adds, noting that much of the online discourse is due to the show’s investment in “what isn’t said.” “Love and lust, these are big emotions that we’re talking about, and this is a show that’s letting characters have those big emotions without treating it like a joke.”

The instant popularity of Heated Rivalry was a surprise to Tierney, who admitted on the What Chaos! hockey podcast that it’s still “a mystery” to him why this particular adaptation has caught fire.

Despite it being a romance-driven story, which often skews heavily toward women, Heated Rivalry has managed to capture the attention (and obsession) of nearly every demographic imaginable — from middle-aged suburban mothers to diehard hockey fans to members of the LGBTQ community.

Some of those unlikely viewers are discovering hockey for the first time, despite the show spending very little time on the rules of the sport — just enough locker room and on-ice action to contextualize Shane and Ilya’s romantic arc and the pressures they face in a culture that historically breeds toxic masculinity and homophobia.

“I think [Heated Rivalry] is definitely shifting the conversation already,” Colangelo says. “Some of the NHL teams and some of the semi-professional hockey leagues on TikTok have already been playfully tackling the increased visibility the sport is getting stateside.”

While Heated Rivalry has inspired watercooler talk on everything from its intimate portrayal of queer sex to its masterful execution of deep yearning, the show has also put a mirror on the sport it roots its story in. “This whole show and the book series is about queerness and hockey and masculinity and the nature of this league. There’s something very meaningful in that idea,” McNutt says.

Retired NHL pro Sean Avery, who played for teams such as the Los Angeles Kings and the New York Rangers, had a different take. “I do think I must have had a gay closeted teammate at some point in my career,” Avery told Rolling Stone, cautioning that the show isn’t an accurate portrayal of the actual sport. “It’s the worst hockey show ever made, but the most incredible gay hockey show ever made.”

Brock McGillis, a former semi-professional Canadian goalie who played in the Ontario Hockey League and the United Hockey League and came out publicly in 2016, years after retirement, was hesitant to anoint Heated Rivalry as the bellwether of change. "It's probably more likely to have an adverse effect on a player coming out,” he told PinkNews, detailing his own experience of secretly dating a man for three years while actively playing.

“The language, behaviors and attitudes that you get in locker rooms are sometimes homophobic — that starts at a very young age and progresses through your whole life,” McGillis explained. “You’re programmed to feel that everyone will hate you and you’ll lose your career.”

Heated Rivalry explores this more directly in Episode 3 through the character of Scott Hunter (François Arnaud), a closeted pro hockey player who grapples with coming out but is fearful of professional repercussions as he secretly dates smoothie maker Kip Grady (Robbie G.K.), who is out and proud. By the end of the episode, Scott decides he isn’t ready to take the leap for fear of alienating his found hockey family.

“So many of [the players], it’s sort of trained out of them,” McNutt says. “They’re not really allowed to be a person — the very notion that once you’re in the system, the system’s goal is to train you to be one thing and to find your identity within that thing. And once you exit that system, you sort of realize, ‘Wait a minute.’”

At least one NHL team is leaning in. The Montreal Canadiens, often referred to as the Habs, recently played the Heated Rivalry trailer on the Jumbotron on two separate occasions — one of them being Pride Night.

“It’s captivating the hockey community because the NHL is not a progressive league,” Kayla LaRosa, host of the pop culture YouTube channel Kayla Says and a hockey fan, tells Yahoo. The NHL does not currently have an active out player.

“There are questions surrounding politics within the league, especially in recent years. And [Heated Rivalry] is a fantasy,” LaRosa says. “As far-fetched as Heated Rivalry is, in some ways it is actually bringing those conversations to the forefront more.”

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Like McGillis, Colangelo doesn’t believe Shane and Ilya’s fictional relationship will translate into real-world change within the sport — at least not yet.

“I don’t think it will inspire somebody currently playing to come out,” she says. “But I do think it will help plant seeds for younger players who will maybe make it into the NHL in the future.”

“There is a big difference between coming out and having thousands of strangers on the internet tell you that they love you and support you on social media and news headlines, compared to how you’re treated in the locker room or on the ice in what is a self-regulating sport,” Colangelo adds. “That becomes a little bit more dangerous if you are marginalized in any way.”