A surprise smash hit for HBO Max, the Canadian gay hockey series “Heated Rivalry” has pushed buttons, prompted serious conversations and created overnight stars.

The 6-episode first season of “Heated Rivalry” is now streaming. A second season is already in the works.

Created, written, and directed by Jacob Tierney, it’s adapted from Rachel Reid’s “Game Changers” series of novels, all set in the same hockey universe, and follows two rival professional hockey players, Canadian Shane Hollander (Hudson Williams, 24), team captain of the fictional Montreal Metros, and Russian Ilya Rozanov (Connor Storrie, 25) star center of the equally fictional Boston Raiders.

Intensely closeted, their on-ice animosity is meant to mask their secret sexual relationship that spans months.

The series is seriously sexual — it barely sidesteps HBO’s often celebrated full frontal nudity. While their combustible passion is a key element of its instant popularity, there is the sense that viewers will start with the sex and get hooked by the romance.

That may be why it appeals naturally to a queer audience but surprisingly is equally popular with women.

As The Hollywood Reporter’s Seth Abramovich wrote, “Against all odds, in a twist virtually nobody saw coming, a modestly budgeted Canadian drama featuring raunchy, borderline-graphic male-on-male sex has become one of streaming’s biggest recent hits thanks in a very significant way to females — straight, bi or otherwise.”

The Reporter’s TV critic David Rooney also noted, “The sex is hot, but it’s the swoony romantic highs and tender insights into queer first love and self-acceptance that make HBO’s breakout hit special.

“Female viewers,” he wrote, “appear drawn by the romance and the toned bodies, of course, but also by the entirely consensual nature of the vigorous raunch, the desire for mutual pleasure between partners and the relative absence of macho toxicity. It’s not just sex but sensitivity that sells, evidently.”

Christina Chang, a veteran Canadian character actor, has a key role as Shane’s mom/manager with a memorable confrontation scene. Her first reaction to reading the scripts?

“I was like, ‘Is this soft core porn? It’s hot. What the heck is happening right now? This is amazing. It’s like ‘Fifty Shades of…’ Thank God it wasn’t me getting naked.”

Author Reid, who is battling Parkinson’s, had never written anything when she began her novel series.

“I just did it out of boredom, a creative outlet when I was raising kids.”

As a Halifax, Nova Scotia, hockey fan, she was aware of the sports toxic masculinity, it’s homophobia. “I kept thinking how difficult it would be to be a closeted NHL player. I wanted to write a book where a player did come out and found happiness and love.”

Hudson Williams, left, and Connor Storrie in a scene from “Heated Rivalry.” (Crave via AP)