WILMOT — Before Thursday’s WIAA Division-1 regional final, Central softball coach Kerri Hintz stressed to her team the importance of manufacturing runs if it wanted to have a good opportunity to defeat Wilmot for the second time in three meetings this season.

“I said, ‘We’re going to need to execute this game. We can’t depend on the long ball,’ ” Hintz said. “I said, ‘We can’t depend on that happening again.’ ”

Hintz was referencing Central’s win over Wilmot on May 5 in which Jess Hrncar’s home run in the eighth inning accounted for the game’s only run.

The seventh-seeded Falcons might not have been counting on hitting homers Thursday, but that was the recipe they used to again beat the 12th-ranked Panthers.

Hayden Krueger launched a solo shot in the second inning, and Randi Rederer led off the fifth with a go-ahead solo blast to spark Central to a 3-1 victory, ending second-seeded Wilmot’s season with an 18-3 record.

“They pretty much proved me wrong on that one,” Hintz said of her pregame point of emphasis.

Central (16-6) will play third-seeded Verona in a sectional semifinal 2 p.m. Thursday, June 4 at Verona. The winner will face the other semifinal winner between top-seeded Bradford and fifth-seeded Milton at 4 p.m. with a berth to the WIAA State Tournament on the line.

Top-ranked Bradford beat ninth-seeded Janesville Craig 4-0 on Thursday, while Verona toppled sixth-seeded Lake Geneva Badger 3-2.

Rederer, a sophomore catcher who had been in a recent slump, finished 3-for-3 with a walk and two RBI. Her final hit, a line-drive single off the center-field fence in the seventh, drove in Bryanna Heckel and gave the Falcons a 3-1 lead.

“I’m been struggling a little bit, but I just went up there with some confidence and swung easy,” Rederer said. “I didn’t think (the home run) was going over, but it was pretty exciting.”

The long-ball-aided offensive support was plenty for junior right-hander Heather Pohlman (13-5) to win her second straight game against Wilmot.

And had it not been for a close play with two outs in the first inning in which Central first baseman Kara Hughes missed touching first base after catching a flip from second baseman Kristin Kretschmer with Wilmot’s Kelsey Saucerman charging down the line, Pohlman would have also recorded her second consecutive complete-game shutout in another pitchers’ duel with Wilmot freshman standout Kristen Wood (12-3).

Pohlman, though, was more than happy to settle for a five-hitter in which she walked one, struck out three and benefited from an error-free defense. Wood, who allowed two homers in a contest for the only time this season, gave up seven hits, walked three and struck out 12.

Krueger, the Falcons’ right-fielder, made a highlight-reel play in the sixth. With two outs, runners at the corners and Central leading 2-1, Wilmot’s Lauren Murdock hit a towering fly ball to the gap that Krueger caught just before colliding with Hrncar, the center fielder. Both players laid on the ground for a couple minutes before getting up, but they played the rest of the game.

“Hayden’s catch was amazing,” Pohlman said. “She held onto that, and if she didn’t I bet they would have scored three runs and we would have been down 4-2.”

“That saved the game for us, there’s no question about it,” Hintz said.

Though disappointed to have his team’s season end, Wilmot coach Bob Movrich said the Falcons deserved to advance.

“Central has been playing really (well),” he said. “They’re not playing like a (six-loss) team, that’s for sure. They hit the ball, and they’re solid all the way around. ... They made some great plays.”