Austin, Tex. — University of Texas at Austin officials have tried appealing to fairness and balance, but today President William Powers Jr. hit Texans where it really hurts.

Football, he said, could eventually end up on the chopping block if state lawmakers don’t agree to scale back a policy that guarantees admission to any high-school student in Texas who graduates in the top 10 percent of his or her class, the Austin American-Statesman reported today.

Mr. Powers was speaking to reporters after testifying before the State Senate’s Higher Education Committee, which voted, 4 to 1, to approve a bill that would cap the proportion of students admitted under the 10-percent plan to 50 percent of a university’s entering freshman class. The bill now faces a vote by the full Senate and the House, which in 2007 surprised many observers by scuttling a similar measure.

This year 81 percent of the freshmen at the flagship campus here are “top-10-percenters,” and next year the proportion is expected to rise to 86 percent. That trend, Austin officials say, gives them practically no flexibility to admit musicians, scientists, and athletes who don’t make it into the top tier for automatic admission.

If nothing is changed, Mr. Powers told lawmakers, the Austin campus might have to cancel its entering summer class this year, stop admitting students from other states and countries, and — the ultimate step for a football-crazed state — eventually abolish athletics.

“I’m trying not to let that happen,” Mr. Powers said. “We’re not at that point. But we’re at the point of triage in making those kinds of decisions.”

The 10-percent policy is also at the center of a legal battle over the university’s efforts to diversify its student body without explicitly considering each applicant’s race. —Katherine Mangan