One embodiment of the invention sets forth a mechanism for evicting data from a data cache based on the data class of that data. The data stored in the cache lines in the data cache is categorized based on data classes that reflect the reuse potential of that data. The data classes are stored in a tag store, where each tag within the tag store corresponds to a single cache line within the data cache. When reserving a cache line for the data associated with a command, a tag look-up unit examines the data classes in the tag store to determine which data to evict. Data that has a low reuse potential is evicted at a higher priority than data that has a high reuse potential. Advantageously, evicting data that belongs to a data class that has a lower reuse potential reduces the number of cache misses within the system.