Shaka Smart is one of the brightest young minds in college basketball. And I'm not just saying that because of what he did yesterday.

What he did was turn down Illinois, in the big-time Big Ten, to stay at Virginia Commonwealth.

This must have come as a dismaying shock to Illinois, which was targeting Smart from the moment it gave Bruce Weber the heave-ho on March 9. And it might, on the surface, seem like a bad career move for Smart.

But think about it: If Smart can win enough at VCU to attract the attention of schools like Illinois, and if he clearly loves it there, why leave? Especially to go to a school whose values were so obviously exposed when it jettisoned Weber -- a decent man who did things so much the right way it ended up costing him his job because, you know, he didn't enough games.

Good for Shaka Smart.