The romance at the center of HBO Max’s scintillating hockey drama Heated Rivalry has taken pop culture by storm — and it turns out the relationship has some very real-life roots.

Rachel Reid, who wrote the Game Changers book series on which Heated Rivalry is based, had two bonafide NHL superstars in mind when she created the characters of Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov.

“One of my inspirations for Heated Rivalry was, obviously, the extremely entertaining rivalry between [Sidney] Crosby and [Alexander] Ovechkin,” Reid wrote on her website.

Crosby, 38, and Ovechkin, 40, have had a generational on-ice rivalry since they both broke into the NHL in 2005, though romantic sparks are not believed to have ever flown between the pair away from the rink.

Is HBO's ‘Heated Rivalry’ Based on a Boo

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