After graduating from Nebraska, Bender served as head football coach at South Dakota State Normal School (now
Black Hills State University) for one season before moving on to
Washington State, where he was the head football and basketball coach between 1906 and 1908 and he posted a 13–1 record in football. His 1907–08 basketball squad also recorded a 12–3 mark, by far the best in school history to that point. Between 1908 and 1909, Bender coached football at
Haskell Indian Nations University and from 1910 to 1911 he coached football at
Saint Louis University. During the 1911 season, reporters in
St. Louis commented that Bender looked like a charm doll called a
Billiken, which were a national fad at the time. His squad became known as "Bender's Billikens," which is the genesis of SLU's athletic nickname. Bender returned to coach Washington State football from 1912 to 1914. In 1915, Bender was hired as head football coach at
Kansas State. In his one season at K-State, his team posted a mediocre 3–4–1 record. However, Bender left a lasting mark by instituting two long-term traditions at Kansas State in 1915: starting the annual
homecoming event and adopting the nickname Wildcats. Prior to the 1916 season, Bender moved to the
University of Tennessee. At the same time, the sitting head coach at Tennessee,
Zora Clevenger moved to Kansas State, in effect trading jobs with Bender. Bender served as head football coach at the University of Tennessee from 1916 to 1920. During his tenure, he compiled a record of 18–5–4 (.741). His best season came in 1916, when his team went 8–0–1, marred only by a scoreless tie against
Kentucky. Tennessee did not field football teams in 1917 and 1918, and Bender posted his worst record in 1919, when his team went 3–3–3. In his final season, he went 7–2 and recorded Tennessee's 100th victory in football, with the two losses coming against
Vanderbilt and
Mississippi State. He is also credited with installing the short punt formation at Tennessee. While at Tennessee, Bender also served as basketball coach for the 1917, 1920, and 1921 seasons, recording a 29–15 mark. After his career at Tennessee, Bender served as a physical education instructor at the
University of Houston. During this time, Bender also coached a volunteer football squad of students for the school. He suggested they be named the Cougars after one of his former teams, Washington State later adopted the mascot and nickname. In turn, the college's newspaper,
The Cougar, followed suit when choosing its name. The university's athletics teams remain known as the
Houston Cougars today. ==Head coaching record==