Heated Rivalry star Kaden Connors reveals his hopes for Sasha's story in season 2

Few TV series in recent months have captivated viewers quite to the extent of Heated Rivalry – and it came as no surprise when the Canadian ice hockey series was renewed for a second run very soon after its first season debuted.

The follow-up outing will be adapted from the sixth book in Rachel Reid's series of source novels – titled The Long Game – and speaking exclusively to Radio Times at the recent BFI Flare Festival, one of the show's stars Kaden Connors revealed his hopes for the next batch of episodes.

Connors stars in the series as Sasha – the former partner of main character Ilya (Connor Storrie) and also the son of his former coach – and he explained some key aspects of his character he'd love the new run will delve into.

"The thing about entertainment is that entertainment is dramatic," he said. "If there's no drama in a storyline, you don't get an arc, right?"

He added: "Sasha lives in Paris, so if he's not fluent in French, he'll know enough still, plus he knows Russian, and would know English as well, because that's the unifying language in Europe.

"So Shane (Hudson Williams) speaks French and Ilya speaks Russian, but they don't know the other language. There's totally so much you can do with that, with language as an aspect of Sasha coming in and being a point of contention."

Connors admitted that he knew "a lot of fans don't want that", given most of them were understandably rooting for Shane and Ilya – but he added: "The victory is only as strong as the battles, right?"

"But I will say that, ultimately, I do feel like this is a positive, happy ending, queer storyline, through and through, for all of the characters," he said. "So if Sasha were to come back in that manner, I imagine him coming in and being there for Ilya.

"In The Long Game, Shane has a community, but Ilya is very alone. So there's definitely characters who could come alongside him, Svetlana, etc, who could show up and kind of be that for him.

"Ilya went down a path of changing, so what if Sasha did too? Then on the other side of that, they could have a reconciliation kind of thing. And suddenly, now it's like, 'Hey, I'm here for you.'"

Connors was speaking to Radio Times for an interview about his new film Lunar Sway, which had its public premiere at BFI Flare and sees him star alongside Noah Parker, Douglas Smith and Gilmore Girls star Liza Weil.

A black comedy written and directed by Nick Butler, it follows a young LGBTQ+ man living in the small desert town of Mooncrest, who is drawn into a wild spiral of events with his boyfriend after his estranged birth mother Marg returns to town.

The world premiere of Lunar Sway took place at BFI Flare 2026. A wider release across the UK is expected later this year.

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