The applicant needs to remember that he/she is competing against others in the same pool of applicants, not against all other applicants. If your pool is exceptionally strong, then you need to be extremely strong in your application to have a chance. If your pool is weaker (pools can be divided by athlete/legacy/race/sex, further factors include international and socioeconomic condition) then your overall application can be weaker. Don’t get me wrong, there can be extremely strong applicants in all pools, but some pools are weaker than others. As pools are divided admissions start to look like a meritocracy as the strongest applicants in each pool are selected for admission. Still there are the essays and how much your particular AO likes them will affect outcomes, so there is still wiggle room for holistic admissions even within a pool. So to answer the original question a 32 can get you into Yale as long as its competitive in your pool.