Las Vegas Aces guards Chelsea Gray and Jackie Young are preparing for a WNBA season, but both said Friday they fully support the players’ union’s push for a new collective bargaining agreement, even if it means striking.

Gray, the Aces’ primary player representative in the WNBPA, said she is willing to strike if the league’s offer doesn’t meet players’ expectations. “If this doesn’t come out to what we want, then I’m OK doing that,” Gray said via Zoom from a Team USA minicamp in Miami.

The WNBPA executive committee was authorized by players in December to call a strike “when necessary.” Over half of the union’s executive leadership reportedly agreed last week to keep a strike on the table.

Young and Gray are currently training with Team USA for the FIBA World Cup Qualifying Tournament in San Juan, Puerto Rico, from March 11-17. Young said she’s doing extra workouts to stay ready for 5-on-5 basketball. “I’m preparing to play,” Young said. “I think both sides want a season and want to play. So I’m just kind of preparing my mind, as I usually do at this point in time, to get ready for a season.”

Labor talks escalated this week after a letter from WNBPA executive committee members Kelsey Plum and Breanna Stewart was leaked Monday. The letter, addressed to executive director Terri Jackson, expressed “serious concerns about how the PA is handling the current negotiations” and cited a “lack of adequate player involvement in the process.” By Wednesday, the full seven-member committee released a statement affirming unity and sharing survey results that the league’s current counterproposal “is not worth taking.”

Gray said disagreements are part of progress. “With any transformation, I think there’s going to be conversations and debates that happen behind the scenes,” she said. “But I think everybody wants the same common goal: to be paid, to be treated, to be valued like we should.”

The league has said a new CBA must be signed by March 10 to avoid delaying the May 8 start of the 2026 season. The WNBPA submitted a counterproposal on Feb. 27; the league responded on March 2. The union has not yet answered, and the league’s latest offer did not change the proposed revenue share, the main sticking point.

Gray, who keeps teammates informed on negotiations, said communication with the union has been “fine.” Young added, “Sometimes you have to have hard conversations.”