I apologize in advance if I hurt anyone with this take but I think that Ozawa Yuko's introduction was used to hint at itakugi. Of course Yuko's flashback was a nice reminder of how kind Yuji actually is, but middle school Yuji aside, I can't be the only one who thought this, I think the nod to itakugi was all made sublty like in the way Yuji talks about the movie he wants to watch emphasizing the underlying theme of love as a way to ask if Nobara wanted to go watch it with him, and Nobara asking him in return if he wanted to go shopping with her. I mean, why would there even be a scene like this, Megumi easily left with Ijichi-san. He could've been made to stay until the banter between the two ended, but he was written out of that conversation as a glimpse on the Nobara-Yuji dynamic.
Don't even get me started about Nobara's heart skipping a beat when Yuko asked whether or not Itadori and her were together. I personally think she was in denial, or that the question must've caught her off-guard because it never crossed her mind.
Also, I will fight you about this but Nobara telling Megumi at the end of the episode that she understood her feelings about Yuji and claims that she was feeling the way she was because she wants to have a boyfriend before Yuji gets a girlfriend, to me, it just looked like a lame excuse. Like, I think even she herself was desperate to make up a reason, any reason, no matter how silly, and convice herself it were true, because if she didn't do that what else could her feelings mean? I think she just wasn't ready to address being in love with Yuji for a lot of reasons, like her feelings could be unrequited, leveling up their relationship to find that they couldn't make it work could ruin their existing friendship, or that it could just be distracting and disasterous for their future missions, either way, there's always a risk involved with acknowledging her emotions and so she refuses.
