The outdoor-recreation opportunities in Fort Collins, not Colorado State's new indoor practice facility, swayed 6-feet-5, 250-pound defensive tackle John Froland to switch his verbal commitment from Northwestern to CSU.

Froland, of Snohomish, Wash., (about 30 miles north of Seattle) ranked three stars on Rivals.com.

He said Sunday night: "I've never been a big city person. ... I just had a good feeling about CSU. I'm an outdoors person, the whole outdoors integrated at CSU as a fit for my personality."

Another factor was the Big Ten school near Chicago didn't offer the construction-management major he is pursuing, he said.

Froland took a recruiting trip to CSU last weekend although he said, "I wasn't planning on switching." He then said he had second thoughts all week, finally deciding: "This is where I belong."

As for those facilities that have been wowing the 23-man recruiting class, Froland said, "The facilities were nice but they are all nice at the Division I level."

He is the second CSU recruit who originally committed to a school from an automatic qualifying BCS conference. Earlier, quarterback Pete Thomas switched from Arizona State to the Mountain West school.

Natalie Meisler: 303 954-1295 or nmeisler@denverpost.com.