COLUMBUS -- If you want to see Ohio State freshman D'Angelo Russell, watch him now. Including Thursday night's game against No. 16 Maryland, he has 10 regular-season games left in his college basketball career, with five more times to play in front of Buckeyes fans on his homecourt.

And then he'll be gone. Maybe as the most fleeting, awe-inspiring, heart-breaking talent of Ohio State coach Thad Matta's career.

This isn't a one-and-done discussion, because Russell has played himself out of the talk and into a certainty. He has to leave for the NBA after this season. The latest mock draft from DraftExpress.com on Wednesday projects Russell as the No. 2 overall pick. (If you want to wait for Russell to make a miracle decision to come back to college anyway, you may do so on your own time.)

This is a wonderful thing for Ohio State. And a terrible thing. The 6-foot-5 combo guard is so good in the present, he's messing up the future.

Russell has developed into such a dominant offensive force, the Buckeyes (16-5, 5-3 Big Ten) can beat almost anybody right now. Yet they are unranked because they are flawed. But because Russell has progressed from good to great to elite in 21 games, he won't get the chance to lead the Buckeyes in a national title run as a sophomore, the year when everything could have come together for Ohio State.

At least two of the recruits for next year - 6-foot-10 big man Daniel Giddens and 6-5 wing scorer Austin Grandstaff - would help the Buckeyes right now, as would 7-footer Trevor Thompson, the Virginia Tech transfer forced to sit out this season.

Getting them together with this current freshman class was why I wrote over the summer that 2015-16 could be the Buckeyes year. But Russell would be the engine to make that team go.

Forget it.

That's why roster management in college basketball makes coaches lose their hair. You try to bring in great players. If they're truly great, they leave for the pros. If they're not that good yet, they might transfer if they don't get enough playing time. The window in between - guys who can contribute for two, three, four years but aren't in a rush to leave - can be small.

When Russell arrived, Ohio State had to hope he'd be a two-year guy. Thinking anything beyond that would have been foolish.

But this latest four-game stretch, in which he's averaged 25.8 points, 6 assists and just 2.5 turnovers, while shooting 56 percent from the field and 44 percent from 3-point range, has hammered home the reality that this is it.

He'll be a one-and-done.

"You have to have constant awareness of how your roster could change," Matta said Wednesday when I asked about roster management. "As a staff we're constantly playing the hypotheticals, what if that happens, what if this happens."

And then they have to go out and find the answers to the necessary adjustments.

Matta can't talk about recruits. But it is no coincidence that with the 6-5 Russell exploding, a 6-5 combo guard recruit is in Columbus this week on a visit. JaQuan Lyle could step right into the Russell role next season.

Although no one may be quite like Russell.

I compared him to Evan Turner. Matta compares him to Mike Conley. In his own way, Russell is also like Jared Sullinger, the big man who was an All-American as a freshman in 2010-11, but still returned for his sophomore season.

"Both guys do a really good job of making plays that made us better, and let me explain that," Matta said when I asked for Sullinger-Russell similarities. "When we had Jared that (first) year, it was so fun to coach because if things broke down, you would just scream, 'Throw it to Jared.'"

The thinking was Sullinger would either get fouled, get a good shot or, as a very good passer, find an open teammate.

Listen now for "Throw it to D'Angelo." End of the shot clock, Russell wants to make a big shot, or, as a natural distributor, find an open teammate.

Matta called it a "luxury." Because the coach knows what he has. When it's over, Russell may be the biggest what-could-have-been talent Matta has ever coached.

One-and-dones have been linked to Matta his entire Ohio State career, but he's really only had five of them. Greg Oden, Conley and Daequan Cook left to be first-round NBA picks in the 2007 Draft after leading that team to the national title game. Big men Kosta Koufos in 2008 and B.J. Mullens in 2009 left and went in the first round without every really developing into their potential at Ohio State. They were drafted on intrigue.

Conley, Oden and Cook basically maxed out the Ohio State experience. Neither Koufos nor Mullens did, for themselves or for their teams, but you had to shrug your shoulders and accept it.

Russell? He is special. He's dominating. He's more consistent than Matta thought he'd be. Yet the team around him doesn't appear to be quite good enough to follow him to the Final Four.

Matta told a story about an early practice before this season when he stopped and told the team that Russell owned half the court. The freshman was that confident right away, that willing to do his thing without worrying about fitting in. Matta's hope was to inspire senior point guard Shannon Scott to take over the other half of the court in the full-court scrimmage.

Matta told another story about a recent practice when he shared a moment of amazement with senior Sam Thompson after Russell made a no-look bounce pass through a defender's legs on a pick-and-roll.

The sentiment? Enjoy it now.

In five months, Russell could join Oden (No. 1 in 2007), Conley (No. 4 in 2007) and Turner (No. 2 in 2010) as the fourth top-five pick for Ohio State basketball since the Ohio State football team last had a top-five pick with A.J. Hawk in 2006.

Matta got within nine points of a title with Conley and Oden. He got three years out of Turner, three years out of Deshaun Thomas and two years and a Final Four trip as a sophomore out of Sullinger, who surprisingly chose to return to Ohio State as a Columbus kid who had grown up a Buckeye.

Russell, from Louisville, doesn't have that kind of connection. He was drawn to Ohio State in part because he knew he could play right away and serve as the No. 1 offensive option as a freshman.

He's done that. So he won't be here as a sophomore. He's just too good for the Buckeyes' own good.