The American television drama Heated Rivalry – about two male professional ice hockey players in a secret relationship – has become the first viral show of 2026.
For most viewers, it is entertainment to be talked about at work or online. For Jesse Kortuem, it hit deeper.
Born, raised and still living in Minneapolis, he grew up with skates on his feet and loved ice hockey – but stepped away from the sport at 17 as he felt he would not be accepted because of his sexuality.
More than two decades later, watching Heated Rivalry inspired Kortuem to come out as gay, believing it shows attitudes within the sport have shifted for the better.
His Instagram post has since gone viral, leading to a “very surreal” start to the year.
“I’m just so grateful for where my life has ended up,” he tells BBC Sport. “To finally have that relief… to bring 110% of myself into the locker room. Something was speaking to me through the show – I had to let something out.
“Then that release was shared with the entire world. For the first couple of days, it was shocking, but now it is humbling – people have reached out to say it inspired them to have the conversation with their parents. I’m honestly speechless.”
Kortuem played ice hockey in local leagues in Minneapolis during his teenage years, and occasionally dipped back into the amateur game as an adult.
It was not until he joined Cutting Edges, an LGBT-inclusive team who play across North America, in 2017 that he re-engaged with the sport – and it was only this year that he felt comfortable to be open about his sexuality with the wider hockey community.
Now 40, Kortuem says he had to “edit” himself in hockey – and life – to fit in.
But seeing the show, in which two athletes enter a loving relationship, stirred repressed feelings.
“I had to hide, and looking back now it was tough,” he says. “It was still a place of comfort, but a place I had to edit myself.
“It was time to put a real face to what this story has done for athletes, to get it out there. And it took off!”
‘The hockey is terrible, but they like the story’
Like many LGBTQ+ amateur athletes, Kortuem has a nagging feeling that having to repress a part of his personality stopped him being his best – and potentially cost him sporting opportunities.
But he says former team-mates getting in touch in recent weeks has helped.
“I didn’t know what would happen if I disrupted the brotherhood you have in the locker room,” he says. “Would I be a target?
“But I’m now at peace. I don’t know where hockey could have brought me, if I would have had a career, but to have that pride on the ice, it feels like home.”
Despite Heated Rivalry’s overtly queer themes, the show has been embraced by the wider hockey community.
It is, of course, escapism rather than a realistic portrayal of what life would be like for a homosexual player in the American top-tier National Hockey League (NHL).
But Kortuem thinks a popular show with a positive attitude towards gay athletes can only do good.
“It really hit me and a lot of gay athletes; our whole lives we were taught it was not OK to be gay,” he says.
“To see the positive reception – not only from gay people, but straight hockey fans – and watching them cheer on these queer hockey players really resonated, even if these are fictional characters who get this Cinderella story.
“Even ex-NHL players have embraced it – they say the hockey is terrible, but they like the story. It can resonate with people, and it means finally, for someone at my age, that it is a positive gay story.
“Not of heartbreak, of being beaten up, or about the Aids crisis – but an inspiring love story.”
‘I’d like the NHL to say they were wrong’
There are currently no active NHL players who are out as gay, though the sport does have more elite LGBTQ+ representation than many others.
In 2021, Luke Prokop became the first player contracted to an NHL club to come out as gay. The following year, Zach Sullivan, who plays for Manchester Storm in the Elite League – the top tier of UK ice hockey – revealed he was bisexual.
Women’s ice hockey, meanwhile, has its own version of Heated Rivalry. Julie Chu and Caroline Ouellette were respective captains of the US and Canada Olympic teams. Since retiring, they have married and started a family.
The NHL, meanwhile, has been keen to capitalise on the popularity of the show, with commissioner Gary Bettman saying he binge-watched all six episodes in one night.
But Kortuem says “a lot of gay people” are “very hesitant” about what the NHL says.
During the 2022-23 season, the league eliminated Pride jerseys after some players refused to wear them. Bettman said shirts had become “more of a distraction” but Kortuem believes the message it sent to gay people was they were “not welcome”.
In an interview with The Athletic, Bettman said: “You know what our goals, our values and our intentions are across the league, whether it’s at the league level or at the club level. But we also have to respect individual choice. And part of being diverse and welcoming is understanding those differences.”
Later that season, the NHL banned players from using using stick tape to express support for social causes, before reversing that decision.
“Actions speak louder than words,” says Kortuem. “I would like to see the NHL say they were wrong.”
Heated Rivalry itself has come in for criticism, for creating an impression that there is a secret network of gay athletes in the NHL – and some have found the explicit scenes too much to handle.
“The sex part in the first two episodes might have been a bit much,” says Kortuem. “I had to tell my 77-year-old parents to stick with the whole show.
“But hopefully it opens people’s minds. I wouldn’t want my 12-year-old niece watching it, but for it not to be edited down speaks volume about wanting to show positive representation of a love story.”
