Hudson Williams Calls Connor Storrie His “Platonic Soulmate” in Sweet Interview Moment

Hudson Williams has finally answered the question that has followed him and Connor Storrie around for nearly a year — and his answer is somehow even sweeter than fans were hoping for.

The 25-year-old Heated Rivalry star sat down for CBC’s The Assembly, and when one of the show’s interviewers put it to him directly — did he ever feel something for Connor that was “more than friendship?” — Hudson didn’t dodge, didn’t laugh it off, and didn’t give one of those polished non-answers celebrities are so good at. He just told the truth as he sees it.

“No,” he said, plainly. And then he explained why that one little word actually says so much about what the two of them have.

What Hudson Actually Said

“Quickly, me and Connor realized we were, like, platonic soulmates, just completely in love with each other,” Hudson shared on the episode, which premiered on Sunday, November 1. “I think that’s what made our friendship so stable and beautiful, is that we realized we could be completely ourselves, be completely guard down.”

It’s the kind of answer that stops you for a second, because it refuses to fit into the neat little boxes people keep trying to put these two in. Hudson wasn’t dismissing the closeness fans see between them. If anything, he was naming it — just not with the label everyone assumed.

“So, I think the thing that made our relationship as rich as it was is, like, me and that man could cuddle for ten hours, and it just mean cuddling, just mean we just love each other dearly,” he went on, before catching himself with a joke that had the whole room laughing. “That’s not a saying,” he added, after a self-censored quip about what their cuddling definitely does not mean.

Clips of the moment started circulating online almost as soon as the episode aired, and honestly, it’s not hard to see why. There’s something disarming about watching a young actor be that open about loving his best friend — no qualifiers, no panic, no PR-approved spin. Just: yeah, we love each other. That’s the whole story.

Why The Assembly Isn’t Your Usual Interview

Part of what makes the moment land is the setting. The Assembly isn’t a standard press junket or a late-night couch chat. The CBC series puts well-known guests in front of a panel of interviewers who are all on the autism spectrum, and the questions they ask tend to skip the small talk entirely. No “so, tell us about the new season” warm-ups. They go straight for the thing everybody’s actually wondering about.

That format has a way of pulling unusually honest answers out of people. There’s nowhere to hide behind a rehearsed anecdote when the question is that direct, and Hudson clearly knew it. He didn’t reach for a joke to deflect, and he didn’t pretend the question was weird. He treated it like a fair question — because, let’s be real, it kind of is — and answered it like someone who has actually thought about it.

The question itself had already made waves before the episode even aired. It appeared in the trailer for Hudson’s episode, which meant fans spent days guessing how he’d handle it. Would he get awkward? Would he shut it down? Would he play coy? Instead, he gave what might be the most thoughtful answer of his press tour so far, and he did it in about thirty seconds.

From On-Screen Rivals to Real-Life Best Friends

Of course, the reason anyone’s asking in the first place is Heated Rivalry. The hit queer hockey drama, which debuted in late 2025, turned Hudson and Connor into overnight stars — and into one of the most talked-about duos on television. Hudson plays Shane Hollander, Connor plays Ilya Rozanov, and on screen their characters spend years as professional rivals before a secret romance upends everything they thought they knew about each other.

It’s based on Rachel Reid’s Game Changers book series, and the show’s first season followed the slow, eight-year burn of Shane and Ilya’s relationship: two elite players who couldn’t stand each other in public and couldn’t stay away from each other in private. Audiences ate it up. The show became a genuine phenomenon, the kind where clips flood your feed whether you watch it or not, and both actors went from relative unknowns to names people argue about online within weeks.

That kind of overnight fame does strange things to a friendship. Suddenly every joint interview gets dissected, every hug gets screenshotted, every inside joke becomes a theory. And Hudson and Connor, to their credit, never really tried to cool it down for the cameras. If anything, they leaned into it — showing up to press events clearly delighted to be around each other, finishing each other’s sentences, and generally behaving like two people who genuinely enjoy sharing a very weird, very public ride.

Connor has spoken about that dynamic himself. After the show debuted and the press tour kicked into gear, he opened up about their friendship and why they’re so physically affectionate in interviews — the easy hugs, the arms around shoulders, the complete lack of that stiff, keep-your-distance energy you see from a lot of co-stars. For them, it was never a bit. It’s just how they are.

The Press Tour Chemistry Fans Can’t Get Enough Of

Here’s the thing about Hudson and Connor: the friendship is the story now, almost as much as the show itself. Fans fell for Shane and Ilya on screen, but they stayed for Hudson and Connor off it. There’s a specific kind of joy in watching two people who clearly adore each other navigate sudden fame together, and these two have never made it feel like work.

That’s also why the “platonic soulmates” line hit so hard. In a culture that tends to assume any intense male friendship must secretly be something else, Hudson just calmly reframed the whole conversation. Yes, they’re completely in love with each other — as friends. Yes, they can cuddle for ten hours and it means exactly what it looks like: two people who feel safe with each other. No, it doesn’t have to be more than that to be real, or deep, or worth talking about.

It’s a refreshingly grown-up answer from a 25-year-old who has spent the last year having his personal life treated like public property. And it doubles as a pretty good description of what a lot of people actually want from a best friend: someone you can be completely yourself around, guard all the way down, no performance required.

It also, quietly, takes the pressure off. Every time Hudson and Connor do press together, someone asks some version of this question. Now there’s an answer on the record, delivered with warmth instead of irritation. Fans who ship the actors can keep their fun; fans who just love the friendship get a quote to frame. Everybody wins, which is rare for a celebrity interview answer.

What’s Next for Shane and Ilya

The timing of the interview couldn’t be better for fans counting down to season two. Hudson and Connor are currently in the middle of filming the show’s second season, which is expected to premiere in April 2027. Creator Jacob Tierney has confirmed the new season will run six episodes, just like the first, with production wrapping by the end of the year.

Season two will primarily adapt The Long Game, the sequel novel that picks up with Shane and Ilya after a decade of secretly seeing each other, while folding in elements from Role Model and other books in Reid’s series. Tierney has said Shane and Ilya’s relationship remains the show’s North Star — everything else orbits around it — so expect the secrecy, the tension, and the slow-burn payoff that made season one such a hit.

The cast and crew clearly aren’t letting the long wait kill the vibe, either. Hudson and Connor just attended a cast and crew Halloween party together over the weekend, keeping the group close even when the cameras aren’t rolling. It’s a small detail, but it fits the picture Hudson painted on The Assembly: a cast that actually likes each other, and a friendship that doesn’t switch off when the interviews end.

For now, fans will have to sit tight until spring 2027 — and rewatch season one a few more times, obviously. But Hudson’s Assembly appearance gave them something arguably better than a teaser: a reminder of why this duo works in the first place. The show gave them Shane and Ilya. Real life gave them something just as good — two guys who found their person, in the platonic sense, right when the whole world started watching.

And if that doesn’t deserve its own little moment in the spotlight, what does?

Source: Just Jared