Load NCAA men's football play-by-play (stats.ncaa.org) from the SportsDataverse data repo

Loads season-level NCAA men's football play-by-play parsed from stats.ncaa.org by the sdv-py cfb_ncaa_pbp parser. Covers FCS and lower divisions that ESPN's feed misses; one row per play with drive and participant context. Published to the ncaa_mfb_pbp release tag on the sportsdataverse-data repo.

For the same plays reshaped onto cfbfastR pbp column conventions (for binding with load_cfb_pbp() / load_espn_cfb_pbp() output), use load_ncaa_mfb_pbp_cfbfastr().

Usage

load_ncaa_mfb_pbp(
  seasons = most_recent_cfb_season(),
  ...,
  dbConnection = NULL,
  tablename = NULL
)

Arguments

seasons: A vector of 4-digit years associated with given college football seasons. Published coverage runs 2013 through the most recent season. Pass seasons = TRUE for every published season. (Min: 2013)
...: Additional arguments passed to an underlying function that writes the season data into a database.
dbConnection: A DBIConnection object, as returned by DBI::dbConnect()
tablename: The name of the data table within the database

Value

Returns a cfbfastR_data tibble.

col_name	types	description
contest_id	character
drive_number	integer
play_number	integer
offense	character
drive_result	character
drive_scored	logical
down	integer
distance	integer
yard_line	character
yard_line_side	character
yard_line_number	integer
play_type	character
clock	character
yards_gained	integer
formation	character
passer	character
rusher	character
receiver	character
kicker	character
punter	character
returner	character
run_direction	character
qb_scramble	logical
pass_complete	logical
pass_depth	character
pass_direction	character
tackler_1	character
tackler_2	character
kick_yards	integer
return_yards	integer
punt_yards	integer
fg_distance	integer
fg_made	logical
is_first_down	logical
is_touchdown	logical
is_safety	logical
is_fumble	logical
is_turnover	logical
turnover_type	character
out_of_bounds	logical
no_play	logical
fair_catch	logical
penalty_flag	logical
penalty_team	character
penalty_type	character
penalty_player	character
penalty_yards	integer
end_yard_line	character
play_text	character
espn_game_id	character
season	integer

Author

Saiem Gilani

Examples

# \donttest{
  try(load_ncaa_mfb_pbp(2013))
#> ── NCAA men's football play-by-play (stats.ncaa.org) from the SportsDataverse da
#> ℹ Data updated: 2026-08-27 04:23:03 UTC
#> # A tibble: 344,180 × 51
#>    contest_id drive_number play_number offense drive_result drive_scored  down
#>    <chr>             <int>       <int> <chr>   <chr>        <lgl>        <int>
#>  1 688871                1           1 UCF     TD           TRUE             1
#>  2 688871                1           2 UCF     TD           TRUE             1
#>  3 688871                1           3 UCF     TD           TRUE             2
#>  4 688871                1           4 UCF     TD           TRUE             1
#>  5 688871                2           1 Akron   PUNT         FALSE            1
#>  6 688871                2           2 Akron   PUNT         FALSE            1
#>  7 688871                2           3 Akron   PUNT         FALSE            1
#>  8 688871                2           4 Akron   PUNT         FALSE            2
#>  9 688871                2           5 Akron   PUNT         FALSE            3
#> 10 688871                2           6 Akron   PUNT         FALSE            1
#> # ℹ 344,170 more rows
#> # ℹ 44 more variables: distance <int>, yard_line <chr>, yard_line_side <chr>,
#> #   yard_line_number <int>, play_type <chr>, clock <chr>, yards_gained <int>,
#> #   formation <chr>, passer <chr>, rusher <chr>, receiver <chr>, kicker <chr>,
#> #   punter <chr>, returner <chr>, run_direction <chr>, qb_scramble <lgl>,
#> #   pass_complete <lgl>, pass_depth <chr>, pass_direction <chr>,
#> #   tackler_1 <chr>, tackler_2 <chr>, kick_yards <int>, return_yards <int>, …
# }