Heated Rivalry Casts Justice Smith and Charlie Gillespie as Harris and Troy for Season 2
The widely popular queer hockey drama series, Heated Rivalry, has just added to its cast for Season 2, with Crave announcing the casting of the fan-favorite characters Harris Drover and Troy Barrett in Justice Smith and Charlie Gillespie.
Fans have been discussing their dream cast for the past eight months for these two specific characters, who are loved across the Game Changers book series by Rachel Reid, and are the main focus of book 5, Role Model.
Smith will play Harris, the social media manager for the Ottawa Centaurs hockey team, as well as a bright light to everyone around him. Gillespie will play Troy, who's a fellow hockey player in the league, along with main characters Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov. Troy has gone through challenging times as of late in the series, and finds himself at a new team without many friendly faces.
“Rachel Reid has given us two beautifully layered characters in Harris and Troy who you can’t help but root for,” the show's producers, Jacob Tierney and Brendan Brady, said in a press release. “From the start of the casting process, we knew we were looking for actors who could create something truly special together and bring that same depth and heart to the screen. Justice and Charlie do exactly that. They immediately connected with the vulnerability and resilience at the core of these characters, bringing an instinctive understanding of who Harris and Troy are.”
Tierney intentionally planned Heated Rivalry with Shane and Ilya being the main characters, but he wanted to work in other books and characters to the series as well, since they all intertwine. He did this in Season 1, Episode 3, with the entirety of the episode covering book 1, Game Changer, featuring Scott Hunter and Kip Grady. Whether Season 2 will have a similar episode with Troy and Harris, or if they will be woven throughout the season, is yet to be known.
Heated Rivalry Season 2 will release in spring 2027 and began production this week, according to various cast members showing clips on social media that they were gearing up to shoot. This includes Dylan Walsh, who playes Shane's dad in the series, and revealed that he believes Season 2 will consist of 12 episodes – this has not been confirmed though.
Heated Rivalry smashed records with Season 1, which released November 28, 2025. It quickly became Crave's top original show of all time, and increased viewership by 400% on the platform. Prior to the premiere, HBO Max aquired streaming rights for U.S. audiences, and as of February 2026, Heated Rivalry hit 10.6 million views, with over a 100% increase of the audience following the finale.
The series is now streaming in 130 countries globally and have won a slew of awards, including 16 Canadian Screen Award wins, which set a record for "the most wins by a series in a single year."
Stay tuned to IGN for more news and coverage of Heated Rivalry as we get closer to release!
Jessie Wade is Associate Director of Editorial Programming at IGN. You can find her watching the latest rom-com and drama shows, getting lost in way too many fantasy romance books, and going down major rabbit holes on YouTube.