A FRONT ROW VIEW: Class of 1995 chapter closes

PRINCETON, N.J. -- Suzy Pures can't look. Not when the Princeton field hockey team has its photo taken. Not when it claims the Ivy League trophy. Playing the final game of her collegiate career is tough enough. Having to watch the team which has just dethroned her celebrate makes it worse. But that is it. A 2-1 loss and it is over. The last bus ride for the Penn goaltender. The last time strapping up the pads. The last time unstrapping them. Pures is one of eight members of a senior class which took a struggling field hockey program and gave it two Ivy titles and an NCAA berth. Last season, Penn had a perfect Ivy record -- only the second team ever to accomplish that feat. Princeton now becomes the third. Coach Anne Sage doesn't want to think about it. "Tomorrow we'll worry about the seniors leaving," she says. For Pures, field hockey is over. The sport she began in the sixth grade at Tabernacle Middle School with a stick she still carries is done. "Here I am with a stick that I don't know how to use?and still don't," Pures jokes about her improvement from that first time in sixth grade until the present. "Regina -- it's the original hockey stick. It's the worst stick in the world. And my dad carved my name in the tail of it." Her dad did not know she was a goalie that first game 10 years ago. "Everyone comes out in their cute little kilts and with their sticks, and here's me -- boom, boom?" Pures says. "He's like, 'My God, what did you do to my little girl?' " Dad is in the stands for her last game as well. No surprises. A solid finale. The game-winning goal comes on a penalty shot Pures is helpless to stop. Penn's most prolific scorer Amy Pine is done as well. So is Mandy Kauffman, although she will try out for the national team. It wasn't supposed to end this way. This class had won as sophomores. This class had won as juniors. But senior year came and another Ivy crown didn't. This year, Penn had the most talent. Other years, it received that something else. "It's really tough to win three in a row," Pine says. "Sophomore and junior years, we came out with a lot of emotion. I think that's how we won. This year we just have so much talent and I don't know what happened." There is frustration and disappointment, and also a great deal of pride. "Our class turned the team around," Pine says after the final siren sounds. "We taught them how to win. We taught each other how to win. We taught each other respect." She begins to tear. A stellar collegiate career is over. Adam Rubin is a Wharton senior from Bellmore, N.Y., and sports editor of The Daily Pennsylvanian.