High school football coach After graduating from Texas A&M, Stiteler served as a high school football coach from 1931 to 1945. He began his coaching career at
Smithville, Texas (1931–1933), and later coached high school teams in
Bellville (1934–1937),
Corpus Christi (1938–1941), and
Waco (1942–1945). In 15 years as a high school football coach, Stiteler's teams won ten district championships, two regional championships, a Texas state championship with Corpus Christi in 1938, and a tie for another state championship with Waco in 1945. His 1938 Corpus Christi team finished the season 13–0–1, outscored opponents 466–85, and won the state championship in front of 21,000 spectators at the
Cotton Bowl. He was the president of the Texas High School Coaches Association in 1942.
Rice Institute In February 1946, after leading Waco to the Texas football co-championship in 1945, Stiteler was hired by
Rice Institute as an assistant football coach. Rice head coach
Jess Neely hired Stiteler to fill a vacancy created when backfield coach
Buster Brannon resigned to take a position at the
University of Florida. Stiteler helped lead the 1946
Rice Owls football team to a 9–2 record and a victory over the
Tennessee Volunteers in the
Orange Bowl on January 1, 1947.
Texas A&M Stiteler returned to his alma mater in July 1947 as the backfield coach for the
Texas A&M Aggies football team. In December 1947, he was hired as the
head coach for the Texas A&M football team following the resignation of
Homer Norton. For the 1949 season, the Aggies won only one game and had a record of 1–8–1. Despite the poor record in his first two seasons, Stiteler developed a reputation as a good recruiter. In 1950, Stiteler turned the program around with a 7–4 record, including impressive wins over
Arkansas (42–13) and
SMU (25–20) and a 40–20 win over
Georgia in the
Presidential Cup Bowl at
Baltimore. The 1950 team had the best record of any Texas A&M football team in the first decade after
World War II (1945–1954). In December 1950, Stiteler reported that he had been attacked and beaten by a stranger near the Shamrock Hotel in
Houston, where Stiteler had been scheduled to address a group of Texas A&M alumni. In March 1951, Stiteler admitted that he had misrepresented the facts concerning the assault. He reported that he had known his attacker and "the affair was a personal one." Stiteler submitted his letter of resignation to the President of Texas A&M upon revealing the true facts concerning "my affair in Houston." In three years as the head coach at Texas A&M, Stiteler compiled a record of 8–21–2. ==Later years==