Inside the Numbers: NHL Draft edition

The 2012 NHL Draft is history -- and all 30 teams will now begin working to help turn the 211 talented youngsters they've selected into actual NHL players.

Here are some of the key numbers from this year's selection process:

1 -- 6-foot-6 player taken in the draft. Swedish defenseman Rasmus Bodin, selected by Detroit in the seventh round (No. 200) was the tallest player selected this year. Three players were 6-foot-5 and 12 more were 6-foot-4; and none of the 16 tallest players went in the first 44 picks.

2012 NHL DRAFT

Oilers grab Yakupov with No. 1 pick

By Mike G. Morreale - NHL.com Staff Writer
With the first pick in the 2012 NHL Draft, the Edmonton Oilers selected 18-year-old right wing Nail Yakupov, making him the first Russian-born player chosen No. 1 overall since Alex Ovechkin in 2004. READ MORE ›

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2 -- Goaltenders taken in the first round. Russian Andrei Vasilevsky went to Tampa Bay with the 19th pick and Malcolm Subban to the Boston Bruins at No. 24. There were no goaltenders taken in the opening round a year ago.

3 -- Consecutive years that the Edmonton Oilers have had the first pick in the draft; the Oilers joined the Quebec Nordiques (1989-91) as the only teams to pick No. 1 in three straight drafts. The Oilers took forwards (Taylor Hall, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Nail Yakupov) in all three.

4 -- Sets of teammates that have been selected within the first three picks of the same draft. Nail Yakupov and Alex Galchenyuk joined the list when they were taken with the first (Edmonton) and third (Montreal) selections this year. It hadn't happened since Vancouver took the Sedin twins with the second and third choices in 1999.

5 -- Players from the Western Hockey League who were taken among the first eight picks in the draft. All five were defensemen -- and all played for different teams.

6 -- First-round picks from the United States Hockey League, up from three last year. The USHL has had at least one player taken in the first round in eight consecutive drafts. In all, 24 USHL players were taken -- 10 of them from the U.S. National Team Development Program

7 -- Defensemen taken by the New York Islanders -- one in each round of the draft. Beginning with Griffin Reinhart with the fourth pick in the opening round, the Isles took nothing but blueliners, the only team to do so. The seven defensemen matched their combined total in the last three drafts.

8 -- Years since a Russian-born player was taken with the first pick in the draft. When Edmonton took Yakupov with the top pick, he became the first Russian to go No. 1 since Washington took Alex Ovechkin with the first selection in the 2004 draft. The only other Russian to be taken No. 1 was Ilya Kovalchuk by Atlanta in 2001.

10 -- Picks made by the Washington Capitals, the most of any team. The Caps were one of four teams that made two picks in the first round. Four teams -- Carolina, Dallas, Nashville and Pittsburgh -- made nine selections. The New York Rangers made the fewest, taking just four players.

12 -- Number of countries that had at least one player taken in this year's draft. Canada led all nations with 99 players, up from 79 last year. Four countries -- Belarus, Germany, Switzerland and the United Kingdom -- each had one player taken.

13 -- Defensemen taken in the opening round of the draft, matching the record set in 1996. That includes eight who were taken among the first 10 picks -- the only exceptions were Yakupov (No. 1) and Galchenyuk (No. 3).

14 -- Canadian players taken in the opening round of the draft. The United States was second with six. In all, seven nations had players taken in the opening round -- including Zemgus Girgensons, the first Latvian-born player to go in the first round (No. 14 to Buffalo).

16 -- Draft position used by the Washington Capitals to take Plymouth forward Tom Wilson in the opening round. Wilson was the first Canadian-born forward to be chosen -- the longest the draft has ever lasted before a forward from Canada was selected.

WEAR WHAT THE DRAFTEES WEAR

19 -- Players from U.S. high schools chosen in the draft. Eight of them are from Minnesota, the most of any state.

24 -- Goaltenders taken in the draft, up from 19 taken in 2011. Eleven of the goaltenders are Canadian, four were born in the U.S. and the other nine were born in Europe. Nine of the 24 goalies were taken in the final two rounds.

48 -- Players from the Ontario Hockey League who were drafted, the most of any individual league. The Western Hockey League had 32 players taken and the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League had 19, meaning that 99 of the 211 players taken came from CHL teams -- down slightly from the 101 taken last year. Of the 30 first-round picks, 18 came from the CHL.

76 -- Defensemen taken among the 211 players chosen in the draft. In addition to the 13 who went in Round 1, there were 12 taken in the fourth round, 13 in the fifth and 15 in the seventh -- including Nick Ebert, who went to Los Angeles with the 211th and final choice.