In SU's case,men's hockey would compete with the basketball program.Colgate and Cornell are nearby which have DI teams.Also,the Crunch are at War Memorial and Utica is next door.Add it up,and I don't think there is space in the market for another hockey team.
Of course if UConn joins the ACC I expect Syracuse women's hockey to move to the Hockey East to join UConn and BC (Cuse and BC are also in the ACC).
As for what programs could start varsity hockey...
California has seven FBS football teams. Those schools could definitely start hockey. Hockey has seen a surge of popularity in California in recent years with the Kings winning the Cup twice. As such, many hockey fans in California wanted better minor league product than the ECHL, and it just so happened that many of the Pacific NHL teams wanted to move their AHL affiliates out west. So, put two and two together and 5 Pacific NHL teams ended up moving their AHL affiliates to California, including the three California teams in the NHL.
So, naturally, the next step is for California's seven FBS schools to launch NCAA D1 ice hockey.
To save on startup costs, existing arenas could be utilized for each team's home games as follows:
California: Oracle Arena (which will need a tenant once the Warriors leave)
Stanford: Cow Palace
UCLA: The Forum
USC: Long Beach Arena
Fresno State: Save Mart Center
San Diego State: Valley View Casino Center (especially if the new Gulls arena is built)
San Jose State: HP Pavilion (especially if Barracuda move to San Francisco or Sacramento which are both building new arenas for their NBA teams)
These seven teams could form their own conference, which would only be the second D1 hockey conference to consist entirely of FBS schools - the other is the Big Ten, which is an all-sports conference that sponsors hockey.
And with the Big Ten going to seven hockey members with the addition of Notre Dame, the all-California conference could enter into a challenge series with the Big Ten in which each Big Ten school plays one of the Cali schools twice every year (once in each arena), alternating who plays who every year - allowing Notre Dame to play USC and Stanford in hockey on occasion (in addition to the annual football meetings with both of them).